When you die, your widow, widower or surviving civil partner may
be able to get to some of your state pension entitlements. These
are basic state pension, bereavement benefits and additional state
pension.
Basic state pension
Your widow, widower or surviving civil partner may be entitled
to some basic state pension based on your National Insurance (NI)
contributions, but only if they have not already built up a full
basic state pension on their own NI contributions record.
When you die, your partner can apply for your NI record to be
used instead of their own, so this will only help them if your
record is more complete than theirs.
If you die while they are under state pension age, they will
lose this right if they:
- remarry (before they reach state pension age)
- form a new civil partnership (before they reach state pension
age)
Your widow, widower or surviving civil partner may be entitled
to any extra state pension you earned by putting off claiming it
when you reached state pension age.
Bereavement benefits
Your widowed husband, wife or civil partner may also be able to
claim the following bereavement benefits:
- a one-off bereavement payment
- bereavement allowance for one year
- widowed parent's allowance (if they have a dependent child or
children)
All these benefits will depend on the amount of NI contributions
you've paid, or are treated as having paid.
Click here to read more about the bereavement
payment.
Click here to read more about the
bereavement allowance.
Click here to read more about the widowed
parent's allowance
Additional State Pension
You may have contributed towards an additional state pension -
also known as the State Earnings-Related Pension Scheme (SERPS) or
state second pension.
If you die, your spouse or civil partner may be able to inherit
some of this additional state pension.
To see how much additional state pension can be inherited, click here.
To find out more about additional state pension, click here.
