Your questions answered

Need help filling in your options form? 

Watch the video below for a step-by-step guide.

Underneath the video you’ll find answers to frequently asked questions. We hope you find these answers useful. If you’ve got another question you’d like us to answer, please get in touch with the Pensions Service Centre (contact details below).

Taking your Age60 benefits
4 mins 20 secs

On 1 April 2010, the age you’d normally start taking your pension benefits increased from 60 to 65. As a result, you get two separate benefits from your pension:

Your Age60 benefits

The benefits you earned before 1 April 2010. You’d normally start taking these benefits when you turn 60.

Your Age65 benefits

The benefits you earned from 1 April 2010. You’d normally start taking these benefits when you turn 65.

Members of the RMPP stopped earning benefits on a Career Salary Defined Benefit basis on 31 March 2018. Therefore, we can’t show you the estimated benefits payable at 60 and 65, or the maximum tax-free cash sum at those ages.

Benefits earned to 31 March 2012 are paid from the RMSPS. 

You’d normally be able to start taking some of your pension benefits at 60, and some at 65. These are called Age60 benefits and Age65 benefits.

You can start taking some, or all, of your benefits as early as 55. This is the minimum age set by the Government. The minimum age is increasing to 57 from 6 April 2028.

If you take your benefits early, the amount you get will be reduced. So, before you decide what to do, make sure you understand how all the different options would affect you. 

You can request a quote using the online Early Retirement form.

Not in most cases. Any cash sum you take with your pension when you take your benefits is tax-free, as long as you don’t exceed limits set by government. Find out more about these limits in the ‘tax relief’ page here. 

 

Scottish Widows manages the Additional Voluntary Contributions for the Plan.

If you make Additional Voluntary Contributions, Scottish Widows will send you a separate statement in the post each year to tell you the value of your savings.

However, if you paid Additional Voluntary Contributions for a long time, your statement might be from one of the companies we’ve used in the past. These include Aviva or Standard Life.

If you filled in your form after 31 March this year, we won’t have included the date we received your form in your Benefit Illustration. You should see it in your Benefit Illustration next year.

If you filled in your form before 31 March this year, and the date we received it isn’t on your Benefit Illustration, please fill in a new form.

If you’re not sure who you’ve nominated or if you want to nominate somebody new, you’ll also need to fill in a new form.

If you joined the Plan on or after 1 April 1987, you’ll get an extra amount of pension each year. This is called the Pension Supplement and you will receive it if you take your Age60 or Age65 benefits before you reach your State Pension age. It is only paid if you are not employed by Royal Mail Group and it will stop when you reach your State Pension age. See the ‘Guide to your pension benefits’ for more details.

How is it calculated?

The Pension Supplement is calculated based on the first £3,328 of your annual salary. If you work part time, we convert this to the full time equivalent. To find out more, get in touch with the Pensions Service Centre (contact details below).

Yes. Our original Plan closed to new members on 31 March 2008. So, if you started paying into a pension after this point, you will have joined the Royal Mail Defined Contribution Plan (RMDCP) instead. On 1 April 2018 the RMPP reopened. It is only open to members of the RMDCP who had more than four years of pensionable service at the standard rate.

 

Get in touch

1

For further help and information,
​contact the Pensions Service Centre:

  • Group 14 pensions.helpline@royalmail.com
  • Stroke 1 0345 603 0043
    Mon to Fri, 9.00am to 5.00pm
  • Fill 1 Pensions Service Centre,
    PO Box 5863, SHEFFIELD, S98 6AB
  • For questions about RMSPS
    benefits visit Capita at: royalmailsps.co.uk

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If you don’t know which section you’re in, contact the Helpline (contact details are at the bottom of the page); or If you recieve an Annual Benefit Illustration the section is noted on the front page.