Settled Status - NI Contributions Gap

[redydemon]

Good afternoon everyone,

I am quite a complicated and interesting case!
I am an EEU National living in UK. Came for the first time in the UK in 06/2016 and worked for about 3 months until 09.2016 when I decided I will go back home to finish my studies and get some work experience home. After that, I crossed the border a couple of times to visit some friends until 08/2018 when I decided to move for good to the UK, study for a post-grad degree, and work.

I got the pre-settled status due to my limited time stayed in the UK at that point (around 2020), but now I had checked my NI contributions and it seems that I have gaps which I am asked if I can voluntarily contribute to filling them (2016/2017 [part], 2017/2018 [full], 2018/2019 [part]). On the gov.UK it appears that as proof of residency for 5 years which is the application for the settled status I will be required to provide the NI.

Am I correct in thinking that I need to voluntarily pay the remaining contributions which will aid my future state pension and also help me apply for the settled status? I am a little bit confused...

Kind regards,

[alterhase58]

As far as I know the NI record may be used for proof of residency - retrospective payment for NI gaps doesn't (im)prove your residency (you can even pay those from abroad). Settled Status is residency based and the NI record "may" be used to validate the fact. Voluntary contributions are just that, voluntary. If UKVI have doubts about your residency record they may ask you for alternative evidence.

[redydemon]

As far as I know the NI record may be used for proof of residency - retrospective payment for NI gaps doesn't (im)prove your residency (you can even pay those from abroad). Settled Status is residency based and the NI record "may" be used to validate the fact. Voluntary contributions are just that, voluntary. If UKVI have doubts about your residency record they may ask you for alternative evidence.

So, the only possible thing I can do is to wait until 09.2023 in order to apply for settled status and around 09.2024 for UK citizenship. Correct?
Do I need any other steps involved between these? Or is there any other way to get settled or UK citizenship faster?

I need to mention that I am married here in the UK to another EU (pre-settled) resident. Does owning a house or anything else, improve this?

Thank you very much for the advice.

[kamoe]

So, the only possible thing I can do is to wait until 09.2023 in order to apply for settled status and around 09.2024 for UK citizenship. Correct?
Do I need any other steps involved between these? Or is there any other way to get settled or UK citizenship faster?

Do you mean you are asking for ways to cover up the fact that you interrupted your residency? Be careful. That is akin to lie to the Home Office. Anyone here advising you on steps to do that would be breaking the terms of service of this space.

If you continuous residency started in 08/2018 then you will be genuinely eligible to apply on 08/2023. Period.

I need to mention that I am married here in the UK to another EU (pre-settled) resident. Does owning a house or anything else, improve this?

Nope.

[redydemon]

So, the only possible thing I can do is to wait until 09.2023 in order to apply for settled status and around 09.2024 for UK citizenship. Correct?
Do I need any other steps involved between these? Or is there any other way to get settled or UK citizenship faster?

Do you mean you are asking for ways to cover up the fact that you interrupted your residency? Be careful. That is akin to lie to the Home Office. Anyone here advising you on steps to do that would be breaking the terms of service of this space.

If you continuous residency started in 08/2018 then you will be genuinely eligible to apply on 08/2023. Period.

I need to mention that I am married here in the UK to another EU (pre-settled) resident. Does owning a house or anything else, improve this?

Nope.

No, I was asking if there are any other steps involved between settled to UK citizenship. I had the impression that ILR is still a thing that I need to apply for before trying the UK citizenship path.

In addition, when I asked about the other ways of applying I mean legally, of course, not everybody has a political chair they can use to leverage the government. The UK law is very interpretable for various departments and just wanted to make sure I understand it correctly, so I can apply it correctly.

[kamoe]

I was asking if there are any other steps involved between settled to UK citizenship.
I had the impression that ILR is still a thing that I need to apply for before trying the UK citizenship path.

Indeed, you need ILR before you can apply for citizenship. It's just that in the case of EU nationals on the Settlement Scheme, ILR is called Settled Status. In other words, ILR and Settled Status are the same thing, the difference is, Settled Status is only available for EU nationals and their families.

If you have pre-Settled Status, you need to make sure you do not break your continuous residency period, that is, that you do not go abroad for more than 6 consecutive months in any 12 month period. You can check this using the absence calculator here: https://the3million.org.uk/absence-calculator

Then:
5 years after your continuous residence period starts (in your case 08/2018) you are eligible to apply for Settled Status, AND
1 year after obtaining Settled Status (ILR) you can apply for British citizenship. For this, a maximum allowance of absences throughout the previous 5 years also apply (no more than 450 days in 5 years, and 90 days in the 5th year).

[JB007]

Am I correct in thinking that I need to voluntarily pay the remaining contributions which will aid my future state pension and also help me apply for the settled status? I am a little bit confused...

Kind regards,

It might not aid your future UK state pension (if there is still one when you retire). But under todays rules (which is all we can go on) It depnds on how many years you need for a full state pension, how many years you have paid and how many more years you have to reach state pension age (which keeps rising).

We saw lots who paid voluntary payments for past missing years when the government said the New State Pension would begin on 6 April 2016 and they now needed 35 years for the full weekly SP amount (up from 30 years). Only to find out they did not increase their SP amount. And once you pay that money to HMRC you cannot have it back.

[JB007]

As far as I know the NI record may be used for proof of residency - retrospective payment for NI gaps doesn't (im)prove your residency (you can even pay those from abroad). Settled Status is residency based and the NI record "may" be used to validate the fact. Voluntary contributions are just that, voluntary. If UKVI have doubts about your residency record they may ask you for alternative evidence.

Voluntary contributions are paid to HMRC and the date they are paid is then given to the DWP (who handle state pensions). They will added to that NIN0 record and show that they were not paid in the tax year the voluntary payment is for: meaning they didn't get them from woring in the UK. I think they also show as a NIC Credit and not NIC Contribution (from working).

Since the HMRCs RTI (Real Time Information) came in in 2013, it has stopped a lot of abuse. With the RTI, employers now have to tell HMRC each time they pay their employees and how much they were paid