The Women Against State Pension Inequality (WASPI) campaign identified around 3.8 million women born in the 1950s who suddenly found they would have to work many more years when the State Pension age was increased to 65 between 2016 and 2018 and then to 66, for both men and women across the UK in October, 2020.
In July 2021, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) ruled that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) failed to communicate the changes with enough urgency, finding it guilty of maladministration, and is currently investigating the harm caused.
Changes to the State Pension age, which were legislated for in 1995, were not communicated through targeted letters to the affected women until 2008, leading the PHSO to find that "The opportunity that additional notice would have given them to adjust their retirement plans was lost”. In a new update, the PHSO has said it is still working on stage two of its investigation, but shared what it plans to do next.
