The BBC“I thought I was going to cry,” says teacher Amy Goldsmith.
“I’ve been upside down in my world for two and a half years and I’d love for it to end.”
Like hundreds of other teachers, Amy is stuck, unable to proceed with her divorce due to long delays in working on the cost of her pension.
The courts need to decide whether it should be shared with her ex-partner, and it is almost impossible to reach a financial settlement without it.
“I was devastated by my relationship and naively thought I could get the paperwork and move on,” she said.
“I’m in another limb now and just feel completely impotent.”
Amy, 43, is waiting for a price from Teachers’ Pension – which runs the teachers’ pension scheme on behalf of the Department for Education.
But it is struggling to meet demand.
The government, which described the calculations as “extremely complex” and required a special role to complete, said it aimed to clear most of the existing backlog by the end of February.
Freedom of Information Request – Submitted by a member of the Teachers’ Pension Cash Equivalent Transfer Valuation (CETV) Support group And seen by the BBC – suggesting that at the start of December 2024 just under 2,000 teachers were waiting for CETV prices.
The Department of Education said the number had dropped to 1,344 by January 6, 2025, but new cases are always emerging.
Amy, from Bristol, teaches history, geography and psychology at a secondary school in Wiltshire.
She is waiting for CETV from July 2024 and cannot get divorce without it.
‘Too stressful’
A divorce requires both parties to provide accurate information about their finances – including any property, savings and pensions – even if the division of assets is otherwise straightforward.
“I was told at the beginning. [the Teachers’ Pension Scheme] Will be in touch within 10 working days,” he said.
“But then the person I spoke to said they didn’t have a timescale to complete the calculations. So holding my breath was not recommended.”
Amy feels that the delay is making a very emotional situation worse.
“I just can’t get closure and move on with my life,” she said.
“You don’t wake up one morning and say, ‘Oh, we’re going to get a divorce’. I’ve been through the wringer. It’s been very stressful.”
David Quentin from Gloucestershire lectures on construction skills at the College of Further Education. He first applied for his CETV in October 2023 and is still waiting, unable to get a divorce without one.
She said: “It’s the first time I’ve ever been divorced, so I hadn’t heard [a CETV] First
“It’s exhausting. It’s hurt me mentally because I want to get on with my life and I’m sure my ex-wife wants to do the same. It’s hurt me financially. It’s happening. I’m still paying a mortgage.”
David has also racked up hundreds of pounds in solicitors’ fees due to the lengthy divorce process.
They have written a series of complaints about the teachers’ pension scheme and their MP Simon Ofer has raised their case in Parliament.
Teachers’ Pension Scheme is one of the largest schemes in the country. Almost two million members.
David said: “Mentally people are on edge, they don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.
“The Department of Education has given us stock answers… and no compensation has been offered.”
Complex calculations
Getty ImagesSteve Webb, former MP for Thornbury and Yate and Pensions Minister from 2010 to 2015, works at an independent pensions consultancy.
He said: “When the pension scheme works out what your pension is worth, it has to do some complicated calculations.
“But the court ruling means that all these public sector schemes have to do some extra complex calculations. They all have to agree so teachers and nurses and civil service schemes all do the same.
“So it takes time to agree and then they need specialist staff to do all these calculations. It’s all just taking time.”
Decision, also known as McCloud Pension Remediesin 2018 found that the government discriminated against young members of public service pension schemes.
As a result, the government made changes to the public service pension schemes, and calculated the values in a new way.
The backlog has to be cleared.
In one Update issued on Teachers’ Pension In December, the website, the service, apologized for the inconvenience caused by the delay.
It said they were first to ban new CETVs between March and July 2023 to account for the change in the pricing method.
And once the backlog was complete, new rules came into effect after the McCloud decision that meant two counts were necessary in many cases instead of one.
The Department of Education said the delay was not due to short staffing and that it was working through cases by date wherever possible.
It said it aims to clear the majority of the current backlog by the end of February 2025, apart from a few “small groups”.
‘No Support’
Steph Collishaw, a 53-year-old music teacher from Frome, Somerset, has been waiting for her CETV since May 2024.
“It really angers me because I’ve worked for 29 years and paid into the pension scheme all that time,” he said.
“But when I need to rely on information that’s rightfully mine, it’s not there.”
She said her divorce proceedings are over and she is currently unable to remortgage because her husband’s name is still on the title deed to her home.
And like many caught up in this delay, she’s become skeptical of promises that things will get better quickly.
“I could be sitting here in another six months’ time, still waiting for my CETV and not knowing if it’s going to happen.
“You’re just trying to live in an information vacuum and there’s nothing out there to help you.”