Active annual benefit statements

The earliest date from which you will be entitled to receive payment of your benefits built up from 1 April 2014 without a reduction is the date you reach your NPA. Any future changes to State Pension Age will mean a change to your NPA. Any benefits you might have built up before 1 April 2014 will retain the NPA, as defined under earlier regulations and therefore future changes to State Pension Age will not apply to this part of your pension benefits.

LGPS regulations provide for payment of benefits at any time from age 55 (increasing to age 57 from 1 April 2028) but a reduction will apply to reflect how much earlier than your NPA you receive payment. You cannot draw your pre 1 April 2014 benefits until such time as you draw your post 31 March 2014 benefits. You are not entitled to receive any benefits until employment ends.
If you have only recently joined the LGPS and leave with less than two years calendar length membership you will not qualify for the benefits shown in this statement and will generally be able to opt for a refund of the total gross pension contributions you have paid less a statutory 20 per cent tax deduction. You will not be entitled to a refund of the pension contributions paid by your employer.

If you have bought in full or you began and are currently making ongoing payment of additional monthly pension contributions towards the purchase of additional annual pension before 31 March 2025 the respective full amount or a pro rata at 31 March 2026 will be included in the annual pension shown. The benefits shown at NPA assume that any ongoing payments are completed in full.

You may have been or still are investigating a transfer of previous pension benefits. Only if any transfer was completed by 31 March 2025 will the benefits awarded be included in this statement. A transfer completed after this date will be included in the statement issued at 31 March 2026.

If you first joined the LGPS before 1 April 2008 your annual pension will be calculated in three ways. Firstly, your membership before 1 April 2008 provides an annual pension equal to 1/80th of your full time equivalent final pay for every full and part year of membership built up. Your membership from 1 April 2008 to 31 March 2014 provides an annual pension equal to 1/60th of your full time equivalent final pay for each full and part year membership built up.

Lastly, for each year of membership from 1 April 2014 you will receive 1/49th of your actual pensionable pay and this will be added to your Pension Account with an inflationary increase or decrease being applied each year so that it keeps its value from the point the pension is earned to the point from which it becomes payable.

The inflationary increase or decrease applied to your Pension Account every April is in line with Treasury Revaluation Orders. During April 2025 an increase of 1.7 per cent was applied to Pension Accounts.

All membership prior to 1 April 2008 provides an automatic lump sum, normally equal to three times the value of your annual pension. All membership from 1 April 2008 will not provide an automatic lump sum. However, you can choose to convert part of your annual pension into additional tax-free cash, subject to HMRC limits, at retirement.

If at 31 March 2025 you were over your NPA a late retirement increase has been included in your benefits shown.

From 6 April 2024 the Lump Sum Allowance was introduced, this being a personal lifetime tax-free lump sum limit of £268,275. Once this amount is exceeded, any lump sum paid will be taxed at the marginal rate of income tax. The Lump Sum Allowance covers any benefits you may have in all tax-registered pension arrangements, not just the LGPS.

Calculated at three times the value of your annual assumed pensionable pay, this is the value of the lump sum which would become payable to your estate or nominated beneficiary(ies) should the worst happen whilst you are in service. 

However, if you have previous membership of the LGPS in England and Wales, then the greater of the Death In Service Lump Sum and the Lump Sum Death Grants payable from earlier membership would be paid.

The amount shown has been calculated assuming you are married or have registered a civil partnership. If you are married or have registered a civil partnership, your surviving husband, wife or civil partner is automatically entitled to receive part of your pension upon death equal to 1/160th of your full time equivalent final pay for every full and part year built up to 31 March 2014 and 49/160th of your actual pensionable pay added to your Pension Account plus enhancement to your NPA. If, however, you live with a partner, either of the opposite or same sex providing certain conditions are met your partner will be entitled to receive a co-habiting partners pension.

NOTE - The Survivor's Pension payable to a surviving widow of a post leaving marriage will not include any membership built up prior to 6 April 1978. A surviving widower of a post leaving marriage, a survivor of a same sex post leaving marriage, or a civil partner of a post leaving civil partnership will not include any membership prior to 6 April 1988 and a co-habiting partner's pension does not include any membership built up prior to 6 April 1988 unless an election to pay additional contributions was made for all membership to count.

Although not included in this statement the LGPS provides for payment of childrens pensions. The amount payable depends on the number of eligible children you have and is payable in equal shares on behalf of each eligible child. For further details please do not hesitate to visit our website at www.berkshirepensions.org.uk 

The Royal Borough of Windsor Maidenhead (the Council), as Administering Authority to the Royal County of Berkshire Pension Fund, has absolute discretion as to the distribution of any Death in Service Lump Sum.

To assist the Council in exercising its discretion, you can make an Expression of Wish to nominate one or more individuals, whether or not related to you and also an organisation, to receive all or a share of the death grant. If the above section is blank, or your circumstances have changed, you may wish to complete an Expression of Wish form, which can be obtained by following the Members section of our website at www.berkshirepensions.org.uk 

Completing an Expression of Wish form avoids the deduction of inheritance tax, that might otherwise be payable, and the possible delay in payment.

Your employer provides the Pension Team with your pensionable employment information, this includes your hours and weeks of pensionable employment including details of any changes during your pensionable employment.

The details received from your employer by the Pension Team is shown below together with details of any transfers received from other LGPS Pension Funds and any other pension arrangements you have chosen to transfer to the LGPS.

When public sector pension schemes changed from Final Salary to Career Average Revalued Earnings (CARE) schemes in 2014 and 2015, older scheme members were protected from the changes. In 2018, the Courts found that younger scheme members had been discriminated against because the protection afforded did not apply to them.

Changes made to the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) Regulations from 1 October 2023 removed the discrimination found, these changes are called The McCloud Remedy and it is only those employees that were in pensionable service during The McCloud Remedy period from 1 April 2014 to 31 March 2022 that may be affected by the changes.

Therefore, if the value of your Annual Pension shown was not built up at any time during The McCloud Remedy period The McCloud Remedy Values shown above will be nil and the following definitions will not apply.

Estimated Provisional Underpin Amount means the Annual Pension you would have built up between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2022 had the LGPS remained a Final Salary pension scheme. This amount is calculated at the date of the statement, 31 March 2025.

Estimated Provisional Assumed Benefits means the Annual Pension that has built up between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2022 in the Career Average Revalued Earnings (CARE) pension scheme. This amount is calculated at the date of the statement, 31 March 2025. If the Estimated Provisional Underpin Amount is greater than the Estimated Provisional Assumed Benefits the difference has been added to the Annual Pension value in Section 3 to produce the final result in Section 2.

Revalued Underpin Amount and Revalued Assumed Benefits are only relevant if you are over Normal Pension Age (NPA) at the date of the statement. These values have been calculated at your NPA. If the Underpin Amount is higher than the Assumed Benefits amount, the difference has been added to the Annual Pension values in Section 3 to produce the final result in Section 2.

Estimated Final Underpin Amount means the Annual Pension you would have built up between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2022 had the LGPS remained a Final Salary pension scheme. This amount is calculated as at your NPA.

Estimated Final Assumed Benefits means the Annual Pension that has built up between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2022 in the Career Average Revalued Earnings (CARE) pension scheme. This amount is calculated as at your NPA.

Estimated Final Guarantee Amount and Estimated Survivors Guarantee Amount is the difference between the Underpin Amount and the Assumed Benefits (where the Final Salary pension scheme would give a higher benefit). This amount is included in the Annual Pension Values shown in Section 5 in the "Total Pension" and "Prospective Survivor's Pension" Amounts.

Further information about The McCloud Remedy can be found by visiting the Pension Funds website - https://www.berkshirepensions.org.uk/mccloud-remedy From here it would be helpful if you could download, complete and return the form 'McCloud: Public Service Pension History'.

The form can be returned by email to the Pension Team's Help Desk - info@berkshirepensions.org.uk 

The Pension Fund has not been unable to include any McCloud Remedy underpin amount for any scheme members that fall into the following categories, as either LGPS regulations are currently not in place, or our system software is currently not able to undertake the calculations:

1) Scheme members with a pension debit with an effective date after 31 March 2014.
2) Scheme members with a Club transfer in.
3) Scheme members with relevant service transferred from a different public service pension scheme or LGPS  
   Pension Fund and the previous scheme administrators have not yet supplied final salary details for the McCloud 
   Remedy period.
4)  Scheme members who joined the LGPS after age 65 and transferred in relevant service from a different public   
    service pension scheme.

Please rest assured it is anticipated future Annual Benefit Statements will include the McCloud Remedy values in respect of these scenarios.

This section of your annual benefit statement confirms the personal details we hold for you within the Berkshire Pension Fund - such as your name, address, DOB and NI number. 

This section also confirms the date you joined the LGPS in this employment and the value of your CARE pay and Final Pay calculated at 31 March 2025. 

Section 2 of your annual statement displays the value of your pension benefits built up within the Berkshire Pension Scheme calculated to 31 March 2025. 

This section will display the value of your CARE pension calculated as at 31 March 2025. CARE pension relates to membership built up within the LGPS from 1 April 2014 onwards. 

If you were a member of the LGPS before 1 April 2014 you will have service under the Final Salary pension scheme. 

Within this section of the statement you will see the projection of your pension benefits assuming you were to remain contributing to the LGPS until your Normal Pension Age (NPA).