I know there’s still some time in hand, but HMRC said they’ve been contacting everybody affected in July, regarding the compulsory change from class 2 to class 3 national insurance contributions. Has anybody received a letter yet? I’m still paying class 2 contributions by direct debit. I also wrote to HMRC in March, but never heard back from them.
Well I got to answer my own question, but I’ll post here in case it’s useful to anybody else.
I received a letter from HMRC today (17th August). Class 2 payments have stopped (final payments taken on the 10th July). Once you receive the letter, you have until 5th April 2027 to apply for class 3, by following their simple online form which you then print and send with your direct debit information (or you can opt to pay annually) to the address they provide.
You can also opt to pay any outstanding amounts with the first direct debit payment. They review each application case by case, but I imagine if you’re already paying class 2 and they send you a letter, I can’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be approved.
I stand to be corrected, but I believe if you’ve already been paying class 2, then the 10 year rule doesn’t apply, and the 3 year one is still used.
Thanks for the update Gareth.
We continued paying our contributions after we moved to France nearly 30 years and now I’m very glad we did. I paid Class 2 for myself and Class 3 for my husband. But even Class 3 was a great bargain.
You’re welcome Helenochka. You must be close to your qualifying 35 years! I have 7 left to go, and whilst it sucks having to switch to class 3, I can’t complain too much. 
Yes, we had to pay a bit more than 35 years because apparently we’d “opted out” at some point while working in the UK. But a couple of years ago the message appeared in Gateway confirming we’d paid enough to get full state pensions.
I don’t understand why more of my friends and colleagues didn’t do it when they had the chance.
Can I ask if you had any problems getting into the Gateway? They don’t accept a French address. I think I will need to call their digital services line to try and resolve that.
It definitely seems like a no-brainer to me, although I’m in the unfortunate position of labour recently announcing that they’re changing the state pension age from 67 to 68 for those my age. I daren’t even look at what my French pension might be, but I know it’s going to be peanuts, which is why I really need the UK one.
No, we didn’t have any problems signing up for Gateway but that was years ago. Don’t have any problems signing in now either. The security codes come through to our French mobiles. Which is more than I can say for the codes from NS&I.
Best of luck Gareth.
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Thanks for the reply!!
That’s interesting, because I had a gateway ID, but because I hadn’t used it for 3 years, they forced me to sign up again, and that’s when the problems began.
Ah yes. I’ve heard that if you don’t sign in occasionally it lapses. I make a point of signing in at least once a year.
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Hmm… My government gateway account uses my French postal address, my French mobile number & used to use a .fr email address (I changed that to a .com one for various reasons unrelated to HMRC).
However, I think there is a move to a different kind of access for new users, GOV.UK One Login. Check out this page…
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That’s correct. I wrote to the Government Gateway team and specifically asked them how frequently did I need to use the GG to keep my access. They said that access is retained provided I used it at least once every 3 years. I now have an annual diary reminder to access it.
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Thanks Badger, I took a look, and opted for the one login, but it says you can only login if you already have a one login account, and there’s no sign up link from that page.
George1 : I suspect digital services can perhaps help me out, but I’ll be sure to login again within 3 years next time. It’s really just to see where my contributing years are at, but it’s information they provided me on the phone. I have less contributing years left than I thought I would have, so have come to the conclusion that when I was 17/18 years old (doing A-levels), NI’s were automatically paid for students back in the 90’s.
Until 2010 (I think) 16 to 18-year-olds in the UK were credited with Class 3 contributions automatically, to preserve their pensions.
So many people are pleasantly surprised when they check their records.
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That was a great deal we had! Initially I thought they’d made a mistake, but then I read something that suggested NI was paid when we were at school, but I couldn’t find much about it.
It would be tough going now. No NI contributions at that age, and then if you were to emigrate to the EU as a young adult, you’d have to pay class 3 for the next 35 or so years.
Follow the ‘Sign In’ route & you will eventually get to this page which allows you to create your new login.
Thanks Badger, the link doesn’t work for me unfortunately as you need a login to access it. I did find another way in, but they require a UK mobile number or an authenticator app. As I don’t use apps/mobiles I’ll have to look into the desktop version a bit later, and see how far I can progress.
HMRC occasionally reminding me that I can “top up” for some of the years that I haven’t paid NI due to living in France, but their math ain’t mathing for me having paid into the system via PAYE for 36 years with zero gaps.
If I pay around £3K to “top up”, their pension calculator says I’ll receive an extra £20 every month, so it’ll be 12.5 years before I’m actually better off.
As I’m 5 years out from getting the UK state pension (if it exists by then) and never factored it in to my retirement finances, I’m currently declining this “offer”.
Government Gateway is entirely happy to send 2FA codes via SMS to my French mobile number.
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NotALot - yes, if you sign up under government gateway you can provide a French mobile number without any problems and I get the SMS, but when signing up again these days due to inactivity (or for a new account), the next page requires a UK only postal address.
Yes, in your shoes I’d be holding onto my 3k.
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@Badger - I seem to have run up against a brick wall. I managed to get a one login account, but once in, you can only manage a state pension, I can’t view a forecast or see contributing years. When I go back to the main page for checking pensions - Check your State Pension forecast - GOV.UK - it tells me I don’t have a one login account despite being logged into it! It then only provides one option - logging in with a government gateway instead. Maybe because it’s still in beta testing, it will change at a later date.
I’ll have to get onto digital services for a workaround.