Home Responsibilites Protection

You are entitled to Home Responsibilities Protection if you are receiving Child Benefit for a child under sixteen, receiving Income Support because you are caring for a disabled person (unless you receive Carer’s Allowance, in which case you will receive National Insurance credits), or are acting as a foster parent or carer.

Home Responsibilities Protection is a scheme which enables you to protect your rights to the State Pension if you are unable to work and pay your National Insurance contributions. It does not work in the same way as National Insurance Credits, but in principle it results in the same advantages. Instead of giving you credit for National Insurance contributions you did not pay, it reduces the total number of years that you are required to pay contributions in order to qualify for benefits including the State Pension. Thus if you are unable to work for three years and these years are recognised as qualifying for Home Responsibilities Protection, the number of years you need to pay contributions will be reduced accordingly, that is, by three years.

In order to claim a full basic State Pension on retirement, you will not be able to use Home Responsibilities Protection to reduce the number of qualifying years you need on your National Insurance record to less than twenty. For more information on the pension system including National Insurance see The Basic State Pension.