Mary O’Brien was planning to retire in 2014 after working for 12 years at a call centre.
The 70-year-old, from Cleveleys, Lancashire, was “mentally ready” to receive her well-deserved state pension once she turned 60. However, her sister-in-law gave her some life-changing news.
“I was expecting to retire at 60, and it got changed to 63. I didn’t know about it as I moved house in between, so maybe I missed the letter.”
After talking to her sister-in-law and saying she only had another year before she could retire, she was told the state pension age had gone up. “I had no idea,” she told i.
Suffering from COPD after working in a wool mill since the age of 15, this was shocking news for Mary, who was ready to retire.
She spent the next three years working shifts at the call centre instead of retiring as expected. The impact it had on her was significant, with her mother living in a care home at the time.
She said: “If I had the state pension when expected, I could have worked less and would have spent more time with her. Everyday, I used to rush to visit her before my shifts, or go afterwards. Its something I still feel guilty about – not giving her enough time. It would have been so different if I had the state pension, I still feel very sad about it.”
When she turned 63, Mary was once again ready to put her feet up. But it wasn’t to be, as she found out she wasn’t going to get her pension until she was 64 and a half. For her, it was “breaking point.”
She said: “I suffer from COPD and get chest infection after chest infection. Plus, I had a very stressful job at a call centre, where I worked on a shift basis. I had no private pension, and wasn’t going to to get my state pension until I was 64 and a half. It was all too much, I couldn’t go on.”
Mary was left with no alternative but to sell her cottage in Yorkshire in 2017 for £220,000, so she could quit her job while not receiving any pension.
“I was very sad about selling my house,” she said. “It was in a lovely village. But my husband said my health was more important than bricks and mortar.”
After selling the cottage, the couple paid off the mortgage, moved into a small flat and were left with roughly £50,000 to live on.
They had no other income, apart from her husband’s “small private pension” and his state pension. She also had to cut down on other expenses to make ends meet, such as giving up her car.
“I made around £26,500 a year from my shift work at the call centre, but never paid into a private pension. I thought the state pension would be there when I needed it. Plus, there was no extra money to go into a private pension, it all went towards our expenses,” she told i.
“When I was 15, I worked in a wool mill. It was a poorly paid job, but most jobs were back then, and there was no concept of women paying into a private pension. I wasn’t told how important they were, it just wasn’t an opportunity for women back then.”
In 2018, Mary finally reached the state pension age, and said that it felt “as if a weight was lifted off her shoulders.” However, she was still very upset by her ordeal, and saying that she was “robbed” over the last couple of years.
“I got £211 a week, which generally covers our expenses as I paid off the mortgage. It was like a lifeline, and a great help – but too late,” she said. “The last four-and-a-half years left me so stressed, and I just couldn’t function properly.
“The Government have ruined lives – they definitely ruined mine. They robbed the time I could have spent with my mum. I told my sister-in-law, if I die before getting the state pension I deserve, I was going to leave a letter to tell the Government just how much they owe my family.”
