Do you live in Thailand full time or the UK?

If living here your pension will be frozen.

I dont know your pension details, but for me in my position, at the time I was told the bastids would cut my state pension because my company pension would take me over a threshhold.

Best you phone Newcastle, have spoken to them before, very helpful people, they wont give you a direct answer, but read between the lines of what they tell you.

I havent paid NI in over 20 years, I wish they would give me back my contributions and let me do my own thing.

As for NI contributions, make sure of what class you pay, class 1 ,2 or 3.

They actually contacted me years ago to tell me i owed them $$$$, I asked them what would I get for making the payments and what would my wife get on my death.
My attitude was, the money is better in my bank account than theirs, hence didnt pay.

I'm in Thailand full time, and I know it will be frozen Fortunately my company pension isn't. That would have been better if I could have worked to 50, but they were changing my shift pattern. More days at work for less money, and new boss was an a_hole. Everyone who knew him as an apprentice, and later worked for him were sacked, left the company, or transferred. So I took redundancy.

Mosha,

Given you're relatively close to retirement age and providing you're in reasonable health and going to live a few years after retirement then the odds are it would make sense.

If you are eligible to pay class 2 contributions

- then they are only GBP 2.85 a week or ball park 150 quid a year. Much cheaper than class 3 rates. This makes it almost a no brainer to pay if you're in decent health and have 5 missing years and 5 years to go before collecting.

www.gov.uk/self-employed-national-insurance-rates

The full state pension is around GBP 159.55 per week so each additional year gets you about GBP 4.56 per week based on the 35 year max and your missing years. 4.56 per week is 237 quid a year. So you can see that paying 150 quid for that year will pay back very quickly if you survive the 5 years to retirement and say a year afterwards

www.gov.uk/new-state-pension/how-its-calculated

{BTW the contribution rates will go up each year, but then again so should the state pension until you start drawing it and it gets frozen. This doesn't take account of the time value of money either, but over 5 years the period is short anyway}

If you have to pay class 3 contributions

- then they are 5 times as much at GBP 14.25 per week or 741 pounds a year. So the decision is less of a no brainer. That 741 quid still gets you that same 237 quid a year. Broadly you're looking at surviving 3/4 years after retirement to make it worthwhile

Worth noting that the contribution 1 year before retirement is probably better value for money than the contribution in the year 5 years before retirement. Of course if you die before retirement or shortly after the money is wasted

The key for you and what makes it probably worthwhile is being relatively close to retirement age. For someone 30 years to go that is a different decision

Here's a link on eligibility for Class2 or Class3 for overseas people.

www.gov.uk/voluntary-national-insurance-contributions/who-can-pay-voluntary-contributions

To start Class 2 you would be living and working abroad . You can only do if you worked in the UK immediately before leaving, and you’ve previously lived in the UK for 3 years in a row or paid 3 years’ National Insurance .

To start Class 3 you would be living abroad but not working. You can do only if at some point you’ve lived in the UK continuously for 3 years or paid 3 years of contributions.

As you already have 31 years then you would qualify for one of the 2 classes. My guess is you would likely have to pay class 3 as you're not working. However it would be worth contacting them to discuss/ ask given the difference it rates. i.e check to make sure as there's a decent saving to be had if you can

Cheers
Fletch

Make the most of those Class 2 NICs since they'll be abolished in April 2018.

How much am I gonna get Fletch?