National Insurance Rebate
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All employees in the UK have a certain amount of National Insurance deducted from their salary each month. These funds are used to fund your state pension. |
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To qualify for a full state pension, you would need 44 qualifying years of contributions. If you leave the country, or retire with less than 11 qualifying years, you will not receive any basic state pension. However, a portion of your National Insurance payment goes towards the State Second Pension (S2P - formerly known as SERPS). |
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You can choose to opt out of this S2P and ask for the NIC to be re-directed into a private or stakeholder pension fund. You will thus be able claim your contributions, including growth thereon when you retire, irrespective of where you live. |
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If you're employed or self-employed or both, there's a limit to the amount of National Insurance contributions you need to pay. If you overpay or wrongly pay National Insurance contributions you can claim the money back. And if you wrongly pay voluntary National Insurance contributions you may be able to claim the money back in certain circumstances. |
Examples of when you overpay or wrongly pay class 1, 2 or 4 national insurance contributions?
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You might have overpaid or wrongly paid National Insurance contributions if: |
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You had more than one job and your combined earnings were more than £844 a week (2010-11 tax year) |
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You stopped being self-employed and continued to pay Class 2 National Insurance contributions |
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You paid Class 2 National Insurance contributions and your profits were less than £5,075 a year (2010-11 tax year) |
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You were employed and self-employed in the same year and paid more than you needed to in Class 1, Class 2 and Class 4 National Insurance contributions |
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You were still working after reaching State Pension age and your employer continued to deduct Class 1 National Insurance contributions from your earnings |
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You were still working after reaching State Pension age and you continued to pay Class 2 National Insurance contributions on your self-employment earnings |
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You paid Class 4 National Insurance contributions on profits for a tax year after the one in which you reached State Pension age or on profits that included employed earner's' income (income that you earned as an employee and on which you've already paid Class 1 National Insurance contributions) |
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To obtain a refund, please call us to assist |
Time limit
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There is no time limit for reclaiming overpaid contributions where, for example, you had two jobs or were both employed and self-employed, or you haven't paid enough voluntary contributions for them to count as a qualifying year for your State Pension. |
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If you have overpaid or wrongly paid for any other reason, there is normally a six-year time limit for claiming a refund. So, for example, a claim for the tax year 2004-05 must be made by 5 April 2011. However, if you are claiming a Class 2 National Insurance contributions refund because your self-employed earnings for the tax year were below the small earnings exception' limit, you must apply for it in writing between 6 April and 31 January following the end of the tax year in which the payments were made, and provide evidence of your earnings for the whole tax year. |
