wasn\u2019t as good as the NHS<\/a>,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n\u201cI could have taken my state pension at the age of 61 as that is what the state pension age was at the time [for women]. But I was worried as I am on my own and I was concerned I wouldn\u2019t have enough to live on to have a comfortable life and continue with activities and things I wanted to do.<\/p>\n
\u201cI ended up deferring my state pension for the full five years and I carried on working full-time until the age of 66.\u201d<\/p>\n
People can decide to defer taking their UK state pension \u2013 and if they do, they will receive an uplift for doing so.<\/p>\n
The level of uplift depends on when you reached state pension age. For those who reached state pension age before 6 April 2016, the rate of uplift is 1 per cent for every five weeks they defer. This works out at a 10.4 per cent increase in your state pension if you defer for 52 weeks.<\/p>\n
For those who reached state pension age on or after 6 April 2016, the deferral rate is 1 per cent for every nine weeks deferred \u2013 or just under 5.8 per cent for every 52 weeks.<\/p>\n
The risk of deferring for a long period is that you might not live long enough to benefit from it financially.<\/p>\n
Watts says she is in a more fortunate position than people who would be retiring today as not only did she benefit from a higher uplift for deferring her state pension, the state pension age was lower. She appreciates that people choosing to defer their state pension today would have to work until an older age than she did.<\/p>\n
For her, she says deferring has proved lucrative, as her state pension annual income is over \u00a317,000 a year.<\/p>\n
That money makes a huge difference, she says, particularly when it comes to the mindset of not having to worry or constantly scrimp and save.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe main thing is that it just allows you to relax and not worry about money all the time,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m not a big spender and not one for cruises or things like that and I don\u2019t go away a lot.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I have activities I pay for and it just means I can buy things like books and clothes and go to see a show without worrying about it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do a lot of musical activities and play the violin. I am also a church bell-ringer as this is something I recently started learning. I am also a walker.\u201d<\/p>\n
Unlike a lot of pensioners who worry about keeping their house warm and affording the heating bills, Watts says she knows she can put on extra heating if she needs it.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy heating bill isn\u2019t massive because I haven\u2019t got a big house. But I don\u2019t have to worry about energy bills and that is worth a lot to your peace of mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m a frugal person by nature, but if I am cold, I can afford to heat the house a bit more. I can also afford to eat sensibly and things like this make a big difference to people\u2019s physical and mental health. Living in cold houses and not eating properly affects people\u2019s health.\u201d<\/p>\n
As state pension usually stops when someone dies, Watts knows there is a risk in deferring it that some individuals might not get to benefit from it for long enough.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a calculated risk, because at this age, you don\u2019t know if you are going to get enough time to enjoy your retirement. However, I knew I didn\u2019t want to be poor and struggling when I retired, so I took that risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am lucky as I have had five good years and I am still feeling fit and healthy so fingers crossed, there will be plenty more.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can only go by my experience, but for me, deferring my state pension has been a highly positive thing and has paid off.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sue Watts says delaying taking her state pension was the best thing she ever did, as it has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357109,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[84,4176,2222,4178,4174,4175,4204,2221,14971,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-357108","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-money","11":"tag-pensions","12":"tag-personal-finance","13":"tag-personalfinance","14":"tag-retirement","15":"tag-state-pension","16":"tag-state-pension-age","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom","19":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}