In this section:
- Notifying your Tax Office when you retire
- Why it's important to fill in your Pension Enquiry form
- Do you need to top up your National Insurance contributions?
Why it's important to fill in your Pension Enquiry form
When you're nearing State Pension age you'll receive form P161 Pension Enquiry asking for details of your age and income, including pension income. It's very important that you complete and return this. However if you're self-employed you won't automatically receive the form - you'll need to request it from your Tax Office or download one below.
Why and when you get a Pension Enquiry form P161
We send you form P161 so that we can work out what tax-free allowances you're entitled to and how much tax (if any) you should be paying when you start to get your pension income. If you don't fill in and return the form your employer or pension payer might have your tax code wrong and you could pay too much tax.
Provided we have your date of birth on record, we automatically send you the form the month before you reach State Pension age. Note that this is different from a letter you will receive from the Pension Service asking you to claim or defer your State Pension.
If you're within a month of reaching State Pension age and haven't received a form you can download a copy below, print it off and fill it in before returning it to your Tax Office.
If you're self-employed you won't automatically get form P161 sent to you. You can download it or you can request it from your Tax Office.
If you are unable to download a form please contact your Tax Office.
We also re-send the P161 to you if you're a woman approaching your 65th birthday. We do this so that we can check if your circumstances have changed.
Go to form P161 Pension Enquiry (PDF 113k)
Filling in form P161
Your State Pension
You'll need to tell us:
- whether or not you've decided to take up your State Pension now or wait until later (deferral)
- the date you expect payments to start
- the expected weekly amount you will receive
Find out about tax if you take your State Pension later on
Other pensions
You'll need to give details of any company pension or personal pensions you're receiving or expect to receive soon.
If your pension has started, you'll find the pension number (sometimes called the 'pension annuity number') on your pension payslips or on letters from your pension provider.
If your pension hasn't started you must write 'Not yet started' next to 'Pension number' and enter the date you expect it to start next to 'Date pension started'.
Find details of a pension scheme using the Pension Tracing Services on the Directgov website
Earnings from employment or self-employment
If you're still employed, you'll need to tell us how much income you're getting.
If you're self-employed, write 'See Self Assessment tax return' where it asks you to complete your monthly or weekly pay. We'll know your income once we receive your tax return after the end of the tax year.
Income from taxable benefits
You'll need to tell us the full amount of any Jobseeker's Allowance you get (this counts as taxable income) and the amount of taxable Incapacity Benefit you get. You only pay tax on Incapacity Benefit after you've been getting it for 28 weeks. We'll be able to see from the date when it started how much, if any, is taxable.
Other taxable income and gifts to charity
When filling in these sections, remember:
- only give us details of your income for the last tax year, ie from 6 April to 5 April
- ignore income that isn't taxable (see link below)
- show only half of any income you get in joint names, such as interest on a joint bank account
If you've sent us a tax return for the last tax year, you don't need to fill in the above sections. Just fill in the box asking for your ten-figure tax reference - you'll find this on the front of your tax return.
Taxable and non-taxable income at a glance
Returning the form
Remember to sign and date your form and send it back to us as soon as possible, using the reply envelope we sent with it. If you've downloaded a form from this website, send it to your Tax Office.
More useful links
What to do if you can't pay your tax bill
Notifying your Tax Office when you retire
