{"id":627098,"date":"2026-06-08T06:44:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T06:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/627098\/"},"modified":"2026-06-08T06:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T06:44:08","slug":"widow-distressed-by-capitas-nine-month-delay-to-husbands-pension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/627098\/","title":{"rendered":"Widow &#8216;distressed&#8217; by Capita&#8217;s nine-month delay to husband&#8217;s pension"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Capita said it had inherited a backlog of more than 86,000 cases rather than the 37,000 it had expected. By early February, that backlog had risen to over 120,000 cases.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The UK government introduced a recovery plan in February. This included 150 government staff and 100 extra Capita staff being drafted in to prioritise the most urgent cases, and an emergency interest-free loan scheme.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Appearing before the public accounts committee that same month, Capita bosses apologised for the problems and promised to resolve urgent and sensitive cases by the end of March.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In April, Capita apologised following a data breach, where 138 members&#8217; details were accessible online.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The company&#8217;s contract to run the Royal Mail pension scheme was terminated later that month. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Paymaster general Nick Symonds said Capita had failed to meet &#8220;critical transition milestones&#8221; and that there was &#8220;a lack of confidence in its ability to implement and transition to the new operating model in a timely fashion&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Symonds also criticised Capita&#8217;s handling of the civil service pension scheme, saying it had &#8220;fallen far short of the required standard&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said stories of members missing mortgage payments and falling into hardship were &#8220;distressing and entirely unacceptable&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;No-one should have to face such financial anxiety after a lifetime of dedicated public service,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Capita said it was continuing to work with the Cabinet Office to establish normal service levels.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Additional trained resource remains in place, and our focus is on ensuring members of the Civil Service Pension Scheme receive the service they expect and deserve,&#8221; said a spokesperson.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;We are sorry for the worry and frustration these delays are causing.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Capita said it had inherited a backlog of more than 86,000 cases rather than the 37,000 it had&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":627099,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[84,4176,4174,4175,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-627098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627098","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=627098"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627098\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/627099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}