Former council workers in the West Midlands are waiting months to receive their pensions after retiring, creating ‘huge hardship issues’, trade unions and a council have warned.
The Unite, Unison and GMB unions and Sandwell Council have raised their ‘extreme concern’ over ‘thousands’ of members awaiting payments in a letter to the West Midlands Pension Fund, which administers the region’s local government pension scheme.
Delays have been ongoing since a new computer system was introduced a year ago.
In the letter, deputy council leader Paul Moore said council staff were not ‘getting a clear view of what is happening behind closed doors at the fund’, and no information about timescale or the size of the backlog had been shared.
Cllr Moore said employees had been waiting up to five months for an options letter following their retirement – from which time they would still face a two-month wait to get their pension.
He said staff were increasingly ‘holding off on retirement’ because of the delays.
