British AND Irish State Pensions

[YeeWo]

Hypothetically: -
- A worker works in England from the aged of 16 to 50 and has made full contributions.
- The same worker works in Ireland from 50 to 60 and makes 520 weekly contributions.

- British State Pension payable from aged 67, Irish State Pension from aged 66.

Is the above worker eligible for BOTH state pensions at the ages shown?!

[mc2fool]

Yes. The two are (almost) independent of each other.

In fact, even if he'd only worked 9 years in the UK he'd be eligible for a UK pension, as the withdrawal-from-the-EU agreement continued the EU pension rules under which countries in the EU, now EU+UK, have to consider service in the other countries for pensions, at least for qualification.

For qualification is all the UK does, so if he only had 9 years in the UK the 34 years in Ireland would "count" for getting him over the UK 10 year minimum. However, those 34 years wouldn't affect the amount he gets (other than getting something rather than nothing!), he'd get a pro rata amount calculated on just the 9 UK years.

I'm not at all familiar with the Irish system but some countries also use services in other EU+UK countries in figuring the amount. I have both UK and French state pensions, and while my French service didn't affect my UK pension, my UK service boosted my French pension a tad (it really is just a tad!).

In any case, the rules state that service in other countries can only (at most) increase the pension you get from any one, never reduce it, so his 10 years in the UK can only (at best) positively affect his Irish pension (if at all).

So, he'll have to look up the Irish system for details on that. The brief summary of the EU(+UK) rules is at: https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/work/retire-abroad/state-pensions-abroad/index_en.htm