AFPS - not fallen off the perch, but certainly dropped off the radar.
It used to be the case that if a preserved military pension wasn’t claimed within 7 years of becoming due, it would be discounted from future accounting. The past few years worth of accounts refer to a trustee conclusion that a deferred pension wasn’t ever going to be claimed if it wasn’t claimed by that time. Fair enough. But the latest AFPS accounts include a number of important changes, one of which is this assumption being subject to the same administrative action from the age of 72 and not 7 years. On the surface of it, still no change really. But if the preserved pension age is set to shift to the right (and it will) then the margin between someone becoming eligible for a preserved pension and subsequently dropping off the SPVA radar will become finer.
The new guidance is a little more draconian than before as well. Slipped in, it now states that if the pension isn’t claimed by the age of 72, then the pensioner is ‘out of time to claim’, rather than a more benign ‘assumption’. I wonder if that is the motivation behind the drive to shave a few quid off the bill. It doesn’t apply to a few; currently, circa 14,000 ‘due’ pensions remain unclaimed, a figure which amazed me. Does anyone know or have experience of the consequences of someone breaching the 7 year rule please, and if so, what were they? Was the pensioner reinstated quite quickly and easily to the payroll? Voxpop, are you able shed any light on what might happen and why the change has happened? Post the 1975 pension revisions, the number affected is only set to increase (another reason behind the change?) so it isn't a sepia problem.
When changing these documents, why don't the trustees publish a record of important amendments? It wouldn't be difficult.