100-year-old starts claiming state pension after two decades of not realising she was eligible

‘I have no idea why it has been kept so quiet,’ daughter says

Margaret Bradshaw did not realise she was eligible for a pension after returning to the UK in the 1990s ( SWNS.com)

A 100-year-old woman has just started to claim her state pension after missing out on payments for two decades.

Margaret Bradshaw, who was born in the UK but mostly lived abroad as an adult, became eligible after her 80th birthday but had not realised.

The former nanny and hotel worker, who has dementia and lives in a care home in Surrey, has missed out on £75,000 in total.

“I’m glad mother has it now, but it shouldn’t have taken her getting to 100 to find out about it,” her daughter, 78-year-old Helen Cunningham, said.

“£75,000 is a lot to have missed out on and I’m sure we aren’t the only ones that didn’t know.”

Ms Cunningham decided to look into her mother’s situation after reading an article that said thousands of over-80s were not claiming their pensions when entitled.

She discovered widow Margaret had been entitled to £82.45 a week since her 80th birthday.

“I had never even heard of an over-80 pension until a few weeks ago - we were never made aware of it when mother turned 80,” she said.

Margaret Bradshaw with her daughter Helen Cunningham ( SWNS.com)

"I had been getting quite nervous about mother’s financial situation for some time as care homes are very expensive, so I felt some relief learning she was entitled to more - even if she missed out for 20 years.”

Ms Bradshaw, who was born in Croydon in 1921, started receiving £82.45 a week as of June 30.

Until then, she had been living off a small pension from her work in Canada, where she had spent 30 years.

When she returned to the UK in 1990, she was not able to claim a state pension as she had not paid any national insurance.

Her daughter reached out to Sir Steve Webb, a former pensions minister, who told her the over-80s pension does not require national insurance contributions.

"I have no idea why it has been kept so quiet but I encourage people to look into it and find out what they might be entitled to,” her daughter Ms Cunningham said.

Additional reporting by agencies