In an almighty error by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), it appears State Pension has been underpaid by more than £1billion.
This is down to repeated human errors, complex regulations and outdated IT systems, a watchdog has claimed in a new report.
The DWP estimates it has underpaid 134,000 pensioners and those it can trace, despite faulty IT, will be paid an average of £8,900 according to the National Audit Office.
Most likely to be affected are women who have not been paid enough when their spouse or civil partner pass away as their National Insurance (NI) contributions were miscalculated.
The true scale of the underpayments is huge, but it could be even larger once a full administrative review is completed.
Around £339million will go to pensioners who are due the benefit's from their spouse or civil partner's NI record and £568million will be handed to widows and widowers who should have inherited more State Pension entitlement.
Paid to those who should have seen and increase in their pension on their 80th birthday, a further £146million is due.
Meg Hillier, chair of the Committee of Public Accounts said: "Although it is positive that DWP is now working to put this right, this is not the first widespread error we have seen in DWP in recent years. Correcting these errors comes at great cost to the taxpayer."
How to claim underpaid State Pension
If you want to claim underpaid State Pension, you can contact the Pension Service by calling 0800 731 0469.
Alternatively, you can head to the service's website, here.
However, the DWP still has no idea how large the scale of the underpayments is, so determining if you are eligible could take some time.
On the claiming process, the DWP has said: "We are fully committed to ensuring the historical errors that have been made by successive [UK] Governments are corrected, and as this report acknowledges, we're dedicating significant resource to doing so."
"Anyone impacted will be contacted by us to ensure they receive all that they are owed."
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