Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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135. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the reason legislation was introduced in 2013 to deprive a person of class S contributions from rental income due to the fact that the person had eight class A contributions in that contribution year. [24215/24]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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Prior to 1 January 2014, a person with solely unearned income under self-assessment, such as rental income, who was in insurable employment during the same year, was categorised as an excepted self-employed contributor. This meant that such persons were not liable for PRSI under self-assessment in respect of the unearned income and would not have been awarded PRSI class S contributions.

Under provisions of the Social Welfare and Pensions Act 2013, which came into effect on 1 January 2014, PRSI contributions became liable by certain insurably employed contributors on their unearned income, subject to the unearned income reaching the chargeable person threshold of €5,000 per annum set by the Revenue Commissioners. This contribution, recorded as Class K, does not provide entitlement to any social insurance benefits.

If an individual has solely unearned income and they do not have income from insurable employment then PRSI class S is charged under self-assessment, as long as the threshold of €5,000 per annum is reached.

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.