DWP publishes action plan to prevent future SPA comms crashes
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The Department for Work and Pensions has published its promised ‘action plan’ based on learnings from the two-and-a-half-year delay to its letter campaign about women’s state pension age, for which it is refusing to pay compensation. It aims to have completed the plan by April 2027.
In late 2024, former work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall declined to follow the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman's recommendation to pay compensation for the DWP sending letters about a rise in women’s state pension age two-and-a-half years late. However, at the time she apologised and promised that “all lessons” would be learnt, with an “action plan” put in place to ensure the department will not repeat its mistakes.
The plan has now been published, ahead of reports about the state pension age by Suzy Morrissey and the Government Actuary which could result in future SPA increases.
The DWP’s action plan contains several things that were already in place, along with learning from PHSO, which organised two workshops to address complaints handling by the department. This was after ombudsman Paula Sussex raised concerns that the DWP might be deprioritising learning from the women’s state pension age comms scandal.
The DWP states that “our overall aim is to improve State Pension age communications” and plans to do this through six actions.
The first of these is to “develop a communications strategy to support delivery of accessible, appropriate, targeted and cost-effective communications on the State Pension, covering April 2027 to 2030”, which is in progress.
The second action, also in progress, is to “deliver a communications campaign that encourages individuals to check their State Pension age using the ‘Check your State Pension age’ digital tool, including paid and low and no cost elements”.
Thirdly, the department will, from April next year, “consider the best way to leverage feedback loops, including from complaints, to identify and consolidate evidence gathered across the customer journey by different areas of the DWP” to gain insight on communications and awareness.
By January, the DWP wants to have set up a stakeholder working group, building on existing stakeholder relationships.
A fifth ‘action’ is that the DWP says it will ensure that learning from the PHSO report informs any future relevant high volume complaint campaigns.
Lastly, it intends to see if any of the learnings could be applied to other DWP services.
The plan is preceded by a lengthy defensive section on retirement planning being a personal responsibility, claiming that “people tend to be focused on the here and now rather than thinking about their own future financial stability”. The department also emphasises its existing communications strategy, involving signposting, information and tools to check entitlement, as well as collaboration with the third-sector.
The state pension age for both women and men has been rising from 65 to 66 and, between April 2026 and April 2028, gradually to 67. From June 2025, DWP began to send letters to people with a state pension age of 67.
The fact the DWP continues to use letters to alert people of their state pension age seems paradoxical. The department had justified its refusal to pay compensation to 1950s-born women by saying that receiving letters sooner would not have made any difference: “The body of evidence indicates that letters would not definitely have been read and recalled – that for a majority of 1950s-born women, an earlier letter would not have influenced the choices they could or would have made.”
It is therefore unclear why it continues to use taxpayer funds to send letters about state pensions and conduct user research about these campaigns, unless it does consider them to be an effective tool – which could have implications for the new judicial review claim launched by Women Against State Pension Inequality, to obtain the recommended compensation. Waspi had settled out of court with the DWP as the department agreed last November to re-take its compensation decision; however, in January it again rejected compensation.
Andy Burnham, who could become the next prime minister, reportedly suggested he would stand by Waspi women following his by-election win in Makerfield but then rowed back saying he would not offer cash compensation but might consider early access to concessionary travel.
The DWP’s top civil servant, Sir Peter Schofield, is due to step down next month for personal reasons. His decision comes as the department has also been under fire over the carer’s allowance scandal and underpayments to women eligible for a home responsibility pension.
Is the government being honest about the effectiveness of letter campaigns?
