Pension fund delay compounds widower's grief

A man whose wife died a week before their 47th wedding anniversary, said an eight-month delay in her pension settlement has compounded his grief.

Christopher Price's wife Sharon died from cancer in May 2024 at the age of 63. However, it took until last week for the West Midlands Pension Fund (WMPF) to confirm his survivors' pension would begin on 25 February.

Mr Price said he received the same letter asking for documents relating to his wife's death three times.

The pension fund apologised about delays and said it had halved the number of outstanding inquiries in six months, after coming under fire last year.

Delays date back to July 2023, when the WMPF installed a new computer software system.

Mr Price said his experience had "really been very upsetting" and had brought "the grief back up again".

His son Michael said he had felt "cut off" by the fund after trying multiple times to confirm his mother's settlement.

He said she had worked for the same school for more than 30 years, and had paid into her pension "religiously".

"They [the pension fund] are supposed to do their bit when it's time, and they haven't," he said.

Last year, the BBC heard thousands of people who had recently retired were facing long delays for payments.

The fund has more than 340,000 members working for more than 850 employers, including local authorities in Birmingham, Solihull, Coventry and the Black Country. It's the second largest Local Government Pension Scheme, holding more than £21bn in assets.

However, 11 Labour MPs are asking the government to launch an investigation into "wholly unacceptable" ongoing delays to payments.

A letter to Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall, written by Halesowen MP Alex Ballinger highlighted the case of constituent Mark Harding, who waited nine months after retiring before he received a pension payment.

Mr Ballinger said: "It's completely outrageous. We need to get those delays down, there needs to be some accountability. If it doesn't improve, as a local government pension provider, there needs to be some heads rolling."

The government has described the delays as "completely unacceptable".

"While the fund's performance appears to be improving, we have asked those responsible to fix this issue as quickly as possible so hardworking pensioners can get the payments they deserve on time," a spokesperson for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said.

Warren Archer from Great Bridge in the Black Country has worked for West Midlands Police for 28 years.

He first approached the West Midlands Pension Fund about retiring last summer.

It took eight months to receive a pension forecast, but he has still not received a timeline regarding receive his pension payments.

"It's frustrating", he said. "I need to plan, but I can't do anything."

He called on the fund to "take accountability".

"I've had no correspondence. It's gone on too long now. We've paid a lot of money into this fund, and we're just getting fobbed off," Mr Archer said.

A spokesperson for the pension fund said it had worked hard to reduce the backlog.

"Over the past four months we have also reduced member waiting times for completing retirement quotations from nine weeks to five weeks on average," they said.

The fund has acknowledged "how frustrating it is for members to wait for information", but added that its improvement plan was "working".