PTM146300 - Other authorised payments: genuine errors: inadvertent payments of pension instalments or lump sums not exceeding £250
Glossary PTM000001
Inadvertent overpayments: Pension instalments or lump sums not exceeding £250 in total that are unauthorised payments
Overpayment of lump sums
The Registered Pension Schemes (Authorised Payments) Regulations 2009 - SI 2009/1171
Inadvertent overpayments: Pension instalments or lump sums not exceeding £250 in total that are unauthorised payments
Due to a genuine error, a pension payable under a registered pension scheme, or an instalment of such a pension, could be paid inadvertently and in circumstances where the payment of that pension means that an unauthorised member payment has occurred. The type of pension involved could include a scheme pension or a lifetime annuity. Similarly, an overpayment of a lump sum may occur, as in example 1 of PTM146200.
Genuine error - example 1
Apart from the case of pensions continuing under a ‘term certain’ guarantee, pensions are supposed to stop accruing on the death of the pensioner. If payments that accrued inappropriately after the death continue to be made, they will be unauthorised unless they fall within the limited conditions of regulation 15 of The Registered Pension Schemes (Authorised Payments) Regulations - SI 2009/1171 - as outlined in PTM062800. The main feature of those conditions is that instalments can be paid within 6 months of the member’s death providing the payer was reasonably unaware the pensioner had died. Clearly then, once the 6-month time limit has passed, the tax rules will regard any future instalments as unauthorised member payments, and the fact the payer might remain unaware of the member’s death does not change the essential character of any payment made. When the death comes to light, the payer can see that the payments made more than 6 months after death were made in error.
Genuine error - example 2
The tax rules normally require that a pension being paid to a dependant who is child of a deceased member must stop when the recipient reaches age 23. If the recipient does not qualify for any of the exceptions that would allow for the continuation of their pension after that time, for example because of a disability, then the payer must make adequate arrangements to stop the pension in time. To this end they may give a clear and timely warning to the bank to stop payments from the necessary date, but it can happen that the bank fails to act on those instructions and payments continue to be made in error.
In both of these examples, if the error was spotted and rectified (pension overpayments were repaid) as soon as reasonably possible, the inadvertent pension instalments (in the case of example 1, only in respect of the instalments paid after the 6-month limit where the conditions in PTM062800 otherwise apply) would not be unauthorised member payments - see PTM146100.
However, there would be an unauthorised member payment if, despite the error being spotted, it is decided the repayment of the inadvertently overpaid pension instalments will not be pursued or the scheme does attempt recovery (in the case of example 1, only in respect of the instalments paid after the 6-month limit where the conditions in PTM062800 otherwise apply) but is unsuccessful and eventually decides to write off the overpayment (even though the decision might be taken on administration costs grounds or out of sensitivity). The exception to this will be if - as may often be the case - one of the categories of authorised payments introduced by the Registered Pension Schemes (Authorised Payments) Regulations 2009 (SI 2009/1171) can then be looked to in relation to payments made in genuine error but left in place. See PTM146100 for links to more details about payments made in error covered by those regulations. The rest of this section deals with the cases where, or to the extent that, this exception does not apply.
The date of the unauthorised payment for the purpose of having to make a report of that payment would be the date that the decision is made not to seek recovery of the overpayment or the date the decision is taken to no longer seek recovery of the overpayment, as the case may be.
Where the overpayment is not pursued or, otherwise, not successfully pursued and the total of such overpaid pension instalments paid after 5 April 2006 (overpaid instalments paid before 6 April 2006 do not count for this purpose) to, or in respect of, a particular member does not exceed £250:
- for its own reasons of cost administration, under its Collection and Management powers, HM Revenue and Customs will not seek to collect the tax that, in strictness, is due in respect of the unauthorised payment (although the payment remains an unauthorised payment), and
- the scheme administrator does not have to report the unauthorised payment to HM Revenue and Customs, and
- the unauthorised payment does not have to be returned on the recipient’s Self-Assessment tax return or, otherwise, be notified to HM Revenue and Customs.
If the aggregate overpayment exceeds £250, then all of the overpayment is chargeable as an unauthorised payment (that is, one cannot deduct £250 as if it were an allowance, which it is not).
For this purpose, the £250 threshold applies to the aggregate of the overpayments actually received by, or in respect of, the member.
Where the conditions in PTM062800 would otherwise apply in respect of pension instalments paid later than 6 months after the death of a pensioner except that the pension instalments have been paid later than 6 months after the pensioner’s death, the £250 threshold applies in respect of the aggregate of the pension instalments paid after the expiry of the 6-month time limit only. The pension instalments paid up to the 6-month time limit would not be included.
Overpayment of lump sums
The conditions described above apply equally where an overpayment of a lump sum occurs, such as a pension commencement lump sum or serious ill-health lump sum. So, the limit of £250 will apply, but any lump sum in excess of that amount, where recovery cannot be made, will be an unauthorised payment to the extent that the amount is not an authorised payment.
For example, a pension commencement lump sum of £100,000 is due to be paid under the scheme rules, but £105,000 is paid in error. The scheme administrator is unable to affect a recovery of the excess. Under the tax rules, the pension commencement lump sum of £100,000 is the permitted maximum, so the whole excess of £5,000 is an unauthorised payment (that is, one cannot deduct £250 as if it were an allowance, which it is not).
Note that a payment of a lump that is intended to be a pension commencement lump sum but ends up exceeding the permitted maximum may still be an authorised member payment if certain conditions are met - see PTM063260.