Frequently Asked Questions

Whether or not you get a State pension depends on how many qualifying years of National Insurance (NI) contributions you have. To get any State pension at all, you must have a minimum of 10 qualifying years. To get the full State pension, you’ll need 35 qualifying years. If you’ve got between 10 and 35 qualifying years, you’ll get a proportionate amount of State pension. You can find out what your State pension entitlement is using the GOV.uk website.

If you have any questions about how your pension will be taxed, you need to contact HMRC directly by telephone on 0300 200 3300 or visit their website at www.GOV.uk/tax-help

You can write to them at:
Pay As You Earn and Self Assessment
HM Revenue and Customs
BX9 1AS
United Kingdom
You will need to quote the Scheme’s reference, which is: 663

If HMRC can’t help and you’re on a low income (up to about £380 a week), you may be able to get free professional tax advice. This includes help with filling in forms and what to do if you owe money to HMRC. Tax Aid is a charity that helps people on low incomes with tax issues. You can call them on 0345 120 3779 or visit their website at https://taxaid.org.uk

When you start to collect your pension, it will be paid as a monthly income, like your salary. WTW, the administrator for the Sainsbury’s Section, manages the pensioner payroll, so they will deduct tax before it’s paid into your account. If you think you’re paying the wrong amount of tax, you need to contact HMRC.

Yes, your deferred pension receives increases between when you left the Scheme (or stopped paying contributions) and when you start taking your pension. In retirement, your pension is reviewed each year in line with inflation and the Scheme Rules.

If you have to retire early because of ill health, you may be able to draw your pension early, at the Trustee’s discretion.

You may have chosen to pay extra contributions to top up your pension at retirement. These are called AVCs.

If you have AVCs, you can either take them as cash at retirement or use them to provide extra income. For example, you could buy an annuity (an insurance policy that pays an income), or keep the money invested and take money out of your pot as you need it. 

The MoneyHelper website has lots of information about your options for taking your AVCs. From the age of 50, you can also speak to a pensions expert at Pension Wise, a free government service that is run as part of the MoneyHelper website.

Please note, if you do want to set up an annuity, it can take up to three months to get everything arranged, so you should tell WTW your plans as soon as you can.

Your pension benefits won’t be affected if you decide to wind down to retirement. You’ll need to speak to your local HR department about reducing your working hours as there are certain criteria for this.

If the cash value of your Sainsbury’s pension is less than £10,000, you may be able to take it all as cash, even if you have pension savings in another scheme. If it’s worth more than £10,000, then you can only take it as cash if the combined value of all your pensions (excluding the State pension) is less than £30,000.

Yes, if you want to work beyond your normal retirement age, your pension will be increased because it will be paid to you over a shorter period of time.

Log in to My Pension to get a late retirement quotation.

Yes, you can retire any time from age 55. Your pension will be reduced if you take it early because it will be paid to you over a longer period of time.

Log in to My Pension to get an early retirement quotation.

Depending on your age, if you also have benefits in the Sainsbury’s Retirement Savings Plan (SRSP) and you’re planning to retire at 55, you may have to wait an extra two years to take your SRSP benefits. This is because the government will raise the minimum pension age (the earliest you can take your pension) to 57 from April 2028. However, this doesn’t affect members in the Sainsbury’s Section of the Sainsbury’s Pension Scheme. 

If you have any other pensions, either personal or workplace, you should check with your providers to see what rules apply to those benefits.

Your normal retirement age in the Sainsbury’s Section is age 65.

Yes, as long as you’re over 55.

You may have heard that the government has raised the minimum pension age (the earliest you can take your pension) to 57. However, this doesn’t affect members in the Sainsbury’s Section, because the law allows schemes that had a minimum age of 55 set out in their rules to continue to offer this as a ‘protected age’ to existing members. 

Depending on your age, if you also have benefits in the Sainsbury’s Retirement Savings Plan (SRSP) and you’re planning to retire at 55, you may have to wait an extra two years to take your SRSP benefits.

If you have any other pensions, either personal or workplace, you should check with your providers to see what rules apply to those benefits.

We work hard to make sure that you don’t have any reason to complain about the Scheme, but if you do have a complaint, please contact WTW, the administrator for the Sainsbury’s Section, in the first instance.

If WTW can’t resolve your issue, the Trustee has a formal process that you can use called the Internal Dispute Resolution Procedure (IDRP). WTW will send you the information you need for this.

It’s run by a trustee company, which has a board of directors who are responsible for making sure the Scheme is run in line with pensions legislation and the Scheme Rules. Some of the directors are selected by Sainsbury’s and some have been nominated by the Scheme’s members.

In 2018, the Sainsbury’s Pension Scheme merged with another scheme, the Home Retail Group Pension Scheme, after Sainsbury’s bought HRG, Argos’s parent company. This is why the Sainsbury’s Pension Scheme has two sections – the Sainsbury’s Section and the Argos Section.

In the sad event that you need to tell us about the death of one of our members, please contact WTW, the administrator for the Sainsbury’s Section. They will send you any paperwork that needs to be completed. Click here to see what benefits are available from the Scheme on the death of a member.

The Scheme pays a pension for life to its members, and if a member dies then their spouse will usually also get a pension. The amount of pension paid is based on the member’s salary and length of service in the Scheme at the time the Scheme closed to new contributions (in 2013), but it works a little differently for Cash Balance Section members.

You can get defined contribution (DC) pension schemes and defined benefit (DB) pension schemes. The Sainsbury’s Pension Scheme is a DB pension scheme. You might also be paying into the Sainsbury’s Retirement Savings Plan (SRSP), which is a DC pension scheme. This video explains the differences between DB and DC schemes.

You can also have a personal pension, which you pay into, but your employer doesn’t. This will usually be a DC pension.

Yes, you can exchange some of your pension for tax-free cash. Following recent changes to the Lifetime Allowance, most people will find the amount of tax-free cash they can take has been restricted to £268,275 unless they have some form of Lifetime Allowance protection. 

Log in to My Pension to see how much tax-free cash is available to you. 

If you exchange any of your pension for cash, this will reduce the amount of pension you get from the Scheme. If you log into My Pension and ask for a retirement quotation, you will be able to see how much monthly pension you’ll get if you take the maximum amount of tax-free cash. You’ll also be able to see how your pension changes if you take a cash sum that is less than the maximum available. 

Log in to My Pension to get a retirement quotation.

The Lifetime Allowance (LTA) is the total pension savings you can have without paying an extra tax charge. From April 2024 the LTA was abolished. At the same time, the maximum tax-free cash you can take at retirement was capped at £268,275 (or 25% of the last LTA of £1,073,100) – unless you have an earlier LTA protection (see below). 

The LTA was first introduced in 2006 and successive governments have raised or lowered it over that time. Members were able to avoid a tax charge by applying for ‘protection’ from HMRC. If you applied for protection when the LTA was higher than its final level of £1,073,100, you may be eligible to take a higher tax-free cash amount.

Contact WTW, the administrator for the Sainsbury’s Section.