These handful of case studies, excluding many of those who did not specify their amount, are owed around £154,500 after being discriminated against by the UK Government in a lump sum only – not including additional pension payments they are entitled to.
Anonymous #3
Teacher- Headteacher – and then Executive Headteacher of a federation. 25 years of service.
Retired 31.08.22. Received RSS Feb 2025 and returned . Complaint issued in April due to lack of response or payment of lump sum owed (£24K). No response. Complaint reissued May. ‘Holding Letter’ response received 2 weeks later – no response to complaint, no timescale given for when this will happen or why payment can’t be released or when expected. Escalated to DfE July, waiting response. Currently unable to know whether we can pay son’s university fees in Sept or not and may therefore need to claim husbands pension early in order to do so.
Emma Mitchell
I taught for 30 years and took early retirement at 55 in 2022. I received my RSS statement on 11th February this year and sent my decision back, by recorded delivery on the 13th Feb. I have heard nothing since. According to the statement, I am owed over £10k lump sum and my pension is lower than it should be. Whilst I am not in desperate need of the money, it is money that I have worked for and am owed.
The TPS is not fit for purpose.
Diane Tonkins
I started teaching in 1990, at this point I was mis-sold a private pension during that scandal, and so subsequently joined the teacher’s pension scheme after a couple of years. However, when I phoned them in 2019 to discuss early retirement as my parents’ had mental health issues, one had dementia and one Alzheimer’s, and needed support at home, I was told that they hadn’t activated my pension in the 1990s even though they had documentation that suggested it should be active including a large payment from the mis-sold pension I originally had.
Since that day in December 2019 I have fought to be credited with my years of service, I have been bullied and disparaged and had any help effectively shut down, including the Pension’s Ombudsman, Pension’s Secretariat, an industry professional and a reporter from the TES. I have found that institutions and systems designed to support those who are in dispute with the TPS have a close and ‘contented’ relationship with the TPS and the personnel in the department set up to not pay out to people what they are owed.
I heard several times, from these organisations, the person I was dealing with in the TPS called affectionately by people in the Ombudsman and Secretariat institution that should have been objective, I have even been told by the Department of Work and Pension that the TES are a nice institution and look after their clients and so they didn’t think there was anything wrong. So I am trying to fight this catastrophic mismanagement as I have only been credited with part of my actual years of service. I am 60 and really wanted to be retired by now and can’t as my pension isn’t at a level that I had expected.
Just to add more context because I couldn’t take early retirement to help my parents they were both sectioned and taken into a mental institution in April 2020 and as COVID then hit they could only be released into a care home and we couldn’t see them due to COVID rules. So we lost the last few years of their lives as Dad died in 2021 and Mum in 2022, they not really understanding why they had been unable to be home or be with their family.
The impact of this and the ongoing and difficult, not to mention unpleasant fight has been greatly affected me personally and my mental health has also a suffered. It has been a nightmare for me and I am still not in a position where my years of service/contribution has been credited to my pensionable service and can still not retire even though early on in the process the TPS initially agreed I had provided enough evidence that I had contributed whilst I was working, however, since then they had lied and denied that and that they had not activated the pension even though they continually said that this was the case for about a year.
I am fighting just for years of service to be accepted and the fact that I chose to pay in as a full-time member of staff when I dropped down to part-time isn’t even a discussion I have been able to have. There is also the fact that they sold me a AVC during the 1990s even though at that point they didn’t believe I had an active pension.
This all means a lot of my pension payments have been taken without me getting the pension for which I made contributions, surely this is fraud!
I also think that too many of the organisations that should help with disputes have too ‘comfortable’ a relationship with personnel in the TPS such that cases are not dealt with in an objective way for the individual. I will also say the Ombudsman I dealt with was unhappy with dealing with ‘another part-time woman’ and seemed less than interested in helping, indeed any progress was achieved by me and other people, the only action he took was to agree to the TPS suggestion of 9.25 years of service without my knowledge or agreement, obviously significantly less than my actual years of service.
He was dismissive and completely supportive of the TPS as he seemed to hold a dim view of woman workers and/or part-time workers, making me feel he valued them less and considered them an annoyance. He did boast about what he could do but actually did nothing what so ever to help me, if the only action he did was that agreement and to take credit for progression I or those that tried to help me achieved. I did complain but he was investigated by his friend who supported him.
Sorry if this is not the kind of case study you were looking for but I am still desperate and am trying to get the pension for which I have contributed all these years.
Graeme Humphrey
Primary teacher, 35 years 1987-2022. Nearly the maximum amount of service transferred to Career Average during the remedy period.
Still waiting for RSS, have no clue what it will say. Every excuse imaginable given by a clearly undermanned, poorly trained and unaccountable TPS. Am member of a Facebook group where others have received their RSS and now face further unaccountable delays for payment of legislated monies.
I have also done ASAR, and my new benefit statement has now disappeared, again no explanation offered. You can’t ring without enormous waits and they have closed down What’s App and other means to contact.
Others have complained to MPs, DFE and ombudsman, all receive generic platitudes. To be honest. I don’t think I will ever see an RSS without legal action.
Steven Tomlinson
I was a science teacher for 30 years in the East End of London (Tower Hamlets, Hackney, Barking and Dagenham).
I was Head of Science for much of that time. I am owed £15,500 lump sum and about £1000 a year extra pension. I retired at 55 in 2020 because I was worried the career average would adversely affect my pension so I thought by retiring it would preserve my 3 best years in the final salary.
I tried to get figures for my retirement before I retired. Never any response so I went ahead retired. Then two weeks after I retired I received 10 identical letters with the required figures. Then I heard about the McLeod judgment and thought I might get something back or at least stay the same. The teachers pension agency kept saying RSSs would be sent out and kept making their own deadlines that they repeatedly failed to meet.
I contacted my MP and made an FOI request to see how many had been sent out. When I contacted TP all I got were excuses about the complexity, numbers involved. I finally received my RSS in February and was surprised at the debt owed to me. The money is supposed to be paid in a reasonable time. It is now 5 months since the RSS, 23 months since they first said RSS would be issued and 5 years since I retired.
There are no updates on their website about when this will be paid. When I contact them they say there is no timescale. They said the same to my MP. What really annoys me is teachers taking retirement no get their RSS choices and money owed yet we are waiting.
Tony Pinch
Teacher for 28 years – 1995 to 2023. Last in work 2021, had to leave through ill health then took ill health retirement in 2023 at 50, before the rollback to final salary.
IHR RSSs were promised by December 2024. Received mine in May 2025 (I know of many IHR cases still waiting) and returned by return post, special delivery. I have had no acknowledgement of receipt and no answer to any secure messages sent asking for confirmation of the payment timeline (supposedly starting ‘from May’ – I only know of 3 payments in the country through the teachers pension group I volunteer on).
The lack of clarity, communication, transparency and honesty is shocking, to say the least.
I have applied for a change from the career average option to final salary in order to access an extra lump sum of £12,000, needed to purchase a more comfortable vehicle for my physical needs and also to have money in reserve for necessary adaptations to the home, aids and private psychiatrist support. The way IHR cases have been treated has been appalling – there are those who will have died from their ill health before this being rectified.
Anonymous #2
I taught for 31 years. I retired December 2022. I have still not received a RSS. I have contacted TP with specific questions and got generic answers weeks later which do not address my specific questions e.g. I presume I am a complex case. Can you tell me why please?
I have 3 colleagues who have received their RSS and returned in February and still not received any money and 2 other colleagues that have not received their RSS. The former have messaged and called and received unsatisfactory responses. I believe I am owed about £20k. My husband is owed £13k according to his RSS.
Cut out from my Schools Week article
Alison Aylott
Affected former school leaders have warned the issue has the same dynamics as the Post Office scandal, with the government “turning a blind eye” as it is not “high on the priority list”.
Alison Aylott, a retired school leader, has been battling to access a pension lump sum she was promised as part of the government’s remedy scheme.
Despite submitting her decision in February to accept a payment worth significantly over £20,000, Aylott says she is still waiting, nearly four years after she retired.
“I missed out on the opportunity to invest that money, whether in an ISA or something else,” she added. “They say interest will be paid, but at what rate? For how long? That’s not really good enough.”
One official link they gave her for further guidance led to a pensions advisory agency that has been defunct since 2018.
…Aylott said attempts to get updates on her case have involved multiple waits of longer than an hour on the TPS helpline.
Anonymous #1
Another retired school leader, who left the profession in August 2023, says ongoing delays in implementing the McCloud pension remedy have left them around £40,000 short.
“I retired knowing what those numbers were likely to be because I’d used the calculator and saved the figures. But I’m now down about £5,000 a year, and short between £30,000 and £40,000 in a lump sum. I can only just manage and I’m seriously considering returning to work.”
The former teacher, who does not want to be named, claimed initial assurances that the issue would be resolved by March 2024 were quietly pushed back, with no firm update since.
When they checked the TPS website, it stated that 125,000 remedy statements for retired members to have the conversation started on compensation would not be issued in full until September 2025.
“It’s my money, and I need it now… We’re being dealt with like the Post Office scandal. Brushed aside because we’re not shouting loud enough. The judges and firefighters got sorted.
“But we’re told the teacher cases are too complicated. I want a timetable, and someone held accountable. This is money I’ve paid in. How legal is it to withhold it?”
BC Media 
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