{"id":548540,"date":"2026-07-19T04:57:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T04:57:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/548540\/"},"modified":"2026-07-19T04:57:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T04:57:19","slug":"capita-pension-delays-force-retirees-into-lump-sum-payments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/548540\/","title":{"rendered":"Capita pension delays force retirees into lump sum payments"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Capita was awarded a \u00a3239 million contract to manage the scheme<\/a>, which covers 1.7 million public servants in the UK and has an estimated value of \u00a3189 billion.\n<\/p>\n

\n Retirees have reported severe delays in pension quotes or monthly payments.\n<\/p>\n

\n The UK Government<\/a> was warned in October last year that significant disruption was likely. But the Cabinet Office has now revealed that a total of 18,425 people have received lump sum payments while they wait for regular monthly payments.\n<\/p>\n

\n Another 5,700 people are currently waiting on pension quotations from Capita, including historical cases left unprocessed by the previous administrator.\n<\/p>\n

\n But SNP<\/a> MSP Michelle Campbell has warned the use of lump sum payments is depriving thousands of people of long-term financial security.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAlmost a year on since alarm bells started ringing, it is unacceptable that thousands of retired civil servants have still been left in limbo,\u201d she said.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cLast October, the UK Government was warned that this would happen \u2013 it is fine saying they have acted now but this should never have happened in the first place.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIt is absolutely ridiculous that despite the disaster this scheme has been that not one UK Government minister has taken accountability.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis has been a total shambles from the beginning and it needs fixed without further delay.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Capita has missed a number of deadlines set by the UK Government, including as recently as June, and has said normal service is not expected to resume until around September.\n<\/p>\n

\n More than 25,000 people in Scotland work for the UK Government across 22 departments, with thousands impacted by the Capita delays.\n<\/p>\n

\n Capita warned it is facing a multi-million pound hit to its earnings as a result of the pensions saga, with a loss of \u00a340 million projected for 2026.\n<\/p>\n

\n In October 2025, the Cabinet Office was warned in a report by the Public Accounts Committee in Westminster that Capita might not be ready in time to properly administer the scheme.\n<\/p>\n

\n There were also warnings the private firm was planning to employ fewer staff than previous administrators.\n<\/p>\n

\n Pension scheme members began reporting severe delays almost immediately after the takeover, with complaints including long waits on the phone to speak to customer service advisers and ongoing pensions not being received.\n<\/p>\n

\n Ms Campbell wrote to the Cabinet Office to ask for an update on delays after constituents had raised concerns.\n<\/p>\n

\n Her letter said: \u201cFor most, these pensions represent their primary source of income. The disruption has therefore caused considerable financial distress, with some needing to take on post-retirement work to pay their bills.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n The UK Government has withheld \u00a39.9m in contract payments from Capita to \u201chold them to account\u201d, the response to Ms Campbell said.\n<\/p>\n

\n A spokesman for the Cabinet Office said: \u201cCapita has failed to meet their critical end of June deadline, repeatedly missing recovery targets and delivering a service that is completely unacceptable to both members and taxpayers.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThis government is now drawing a line in the sand. While we will continue to apply robust commercial levers, including withholding payments, to hold them firmly to account, we are looking beyond short-term fixes.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe have set out our intention to advance the biggest wave of insourcing in a generation and we are now actively shaping a long-term strategy to bring this pension scheme back in-house.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Capita has repeatedly apologised for the delays. A spokeswoman said: \u201cWe continue to work at pace to resolve the operational issues in collaboration with the Cabinet Office.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cDespite the progress made the date, we recognise the service has not been good enough, particularly for members waiting on bereavement, retirement and quotation cases, and we are sorry for the distress and inconvenience experienced by those members.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe now have the processes, automation and technology in place to work through the backlog.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe remain committed to working through the backlog as quickly as possible, protecting members and ensuring new cases are processed within contractual service times.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Kay Donald, whose husband Barry died in September last year, told BBC Scotland<\/a> last month that significant delays to his pension payout have left her unable to move on.\n<\/p>\n

\n Barry, 63, had worked at Social Security Scotland, the government agency managing devolved benefits, for the last five years.\n<\/p>\n

\n She told the BBC she felt like she was being treated as if her death in service claim was fraudulent.\n<\/p>\n

\n She said: “Nothing seems to be working. It’s distressing.\n<\/p>\n

\n “It might just be they’re just overwhelmed, I don’t know. But they’re not as overwhelmed as we are as a family. We can’t get moving on while this is still ongoing.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Capita was awarded a \u00a3239 million contract to manage the scheme, which covers 1.7 million public servants in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":548541,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[114,268,85,46,266,267],"class_list":["post-548540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=548540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548540\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/548541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}