Contingent decisions

If you cancelled an Added Years or Additional Pension arrangement in the legacy scheme because of the discrimination identified in the McCloud judgement, you may be able to choose to undo that cancellation.

Active or deferred members of the 2015 Scheme who paid Early Retirement Reduction Buy Out (ERRBO) contributions between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2022 will receive a letter explaining they have options for what to do with these contributions.

These members have this choice because their 2015 Scheme membership for the period between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2022 has been moved back to the 1995/2008 Scheme as part of the Public Service Pensions Remedy (PSPR).

As ERRBO is not available in the 1995/2008 Scheme, these members are being contacted to ask what they would like to do with the ERRBO contributions they paid during this period, known as the remedy period.

As part of the PSPR, members will be given a choice of 1995/2008 Scheme or 2015 Scheme benefits for the remedy period when they retire. This means that what they choose to do with their affected ERRBO contributions now will affect the options they have when they claim their pension benefits.

The first option is to wait until retirement to take these contributions. This means you’ll still have the option to choose 2015 Scheme benefits for the remedy period and use your contributions to retire earlier without any reductions to your pension. If you decide the 1995/2008 Scheme is better for you, you can have your ERRBO contributions paid back to you with interest, or convert them to additional pension.

The second option is to apply to have these contributions paid back to you now. This means that if you choose the 2015 Scheme for the remedy period when you retire, you will no longer have ERRBO contributions for this period.

If you are affected by this, you will receive a letter explaining your options in detail, including a summary of how much your ERRBO contributions add up to.

Original Choice members, who moved to the 2008 Section, have not been given the option to reverse their Choice decision as those members could have remained in the 1995 section.

However, if you had 1995 Section benefits that you decided to move to the 2008 Section as part of the Choice 2 exercise, you may have the option to revisit this decision.

If you are affected and have received a letter about this, we’ve updated the information available to help you decide.​​​

A member factsheet – including an example and answers to common questions (PDF: 232KB)A decision tree – showing how the age you plan to retire may affect which Section is best for you (PDF: 191KB)An illustrator - a tool to help you understand how factors like retirement age, joining date, final salary, and full or part time hours affect pension benefits in both sections of the Scheme (Excel: 61KB)

We’ve extended the deadline for you to decide to 18 June 2024. If you have any questions, contact mccloudchoice2@nhsbsa.nhs.uk and we'll respond within two weeks.

You may be able to reinstate remedy period service if you opted out of the NHS Pension Scheme because of the discrimination identified in the McCloud judgement. You may be able to specify the period of opted-out service you wish to reinstate.

If you owe contributions for reinstated service and you’re an active or deferred member, you may be able to pay these contributions via a lump sum or an instalment plan. If you’re a pensioner member, you may be able to deduct these from your pension benefits that are already in payment.

If you apply to reinstate opted out service, you may be asked to confirm if you received recycled employer pension contributions for the service you wish to reinstate. If you did, your employer will be asked to revisit these pension recycling arrangements with you.