Destined not to benefit

FIVE-MINUTE GUIDE TO... FROZEN PENSIONS

- By Harvey Jones

THE TRIPLE lock does good work in protecting the value of the state pension, but for around 450,000 pensioners it doesn’t work at all. That is because they have retired abroad to a country where the pension is “frozen”, meaning it was locked at the rate they first received it and hasn’t risen again.

Under the triple lock, the state pension climbs either by consumer price inflation (CPI), earnings growth or 2.5%, whichever is highest.

The state pension increased by 4.1% in April this year and 8.5% in 2024, both in line with earnings.

In 2023, it rose 10.1%, in line with CPI. These big increases have helped protect pensioners throughout the cost-of-living crisis, sparing them immense hardship.

Yet many expats do not benefit at all. In some cases, they only realise the danger when it is too late, which comes as a shock for those who automatically assumed that their pension would keep pace with living costs.