Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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Under the social security arrangements between Ireland and the United Kingdom, the respective authorities exchange social insurance record details for pension entitlement assessment purposes.

State Pension (Contributory) applications are examined to establish entitlement based on a person’s Irish contribution record. If a person does not qualify for the pension or qualifies for a reduced rate pension, their entitlement using UK contributions or contributions from other countries covered by EU Regulations or countries with which Ireland has bilateral agreements is examined.

If a person indicates that they worked in the UK, an application for a UK pension is forwarded electronically to the UK authorities on their behalf, together with their Irish social insurance record. If their UK social insurance record is required to determine entitlement to a pension from my department, a copy of their record is also requested from the Department of Work and Pensions in the UK.

Documents are exchanged electronically using a system approved for the electronic exchange of social security information. While many records are received within a short period of time, others may take a prolonged period, due to incomplete information and the complexities of identifying older records.

While information is not readily available in relation to the average waiting time for receipt of insurance records requested from the UK, my department is in contact on an ongoing basis with the UK authorities regarding the exchange of information between the two jurisdictions to ensure applications are processed and that decisions on entitlement are made as quickly as possible.

If the Deputy has details of a specific case where it appears there may have been a delay in processing, the information should be provided to my Department for review.