Latest Moan From You and Me 2025

About sums it up, @shiney.

 

I am also a WASPI. Luckily for me unlike many women of my generation having my OAP delayed was not a massive problem financially but to my mind was extremely unfair. To rub salt into the wound my birthday is at the end of April so had to wait another year….wouldn’t if I had been born a couple of weeks earlier. I will swear on a stack of bibles that I never received anything about the delay in my OAP.
I am not a burn your bra type but do wonder if men had been treated as poorly as us women have, whether the outcome would have been different. What’s that saying about lies and politicians?! How many times have we been promised this and that to get our votes only for an immediate turn around once in power. Something beginning with s pretty much sums the lot of them up who all seem to have “noses in the trough” whatever colour of rosette they wear….don’t even get me started on the SNP, they are on a different level!

 

Having been a member of a few forums since 2008 I've found that people sometimes disappear. I take breaks myself sometimes, but I know that if someone seems 'friendly' I tend to worry about them when I haven't seen them contributing for a while. Unfortunately, unlike people in the real world we may never know why they've disappeared, and that tends to make me worry more about them .

 

That’s true, @Michael Hewett. I’ve dropped out of various forums for various reasons. Sometimes I am still in touch with “friends” made there, but sometimes not. It can be hard to decide whether to wave on your way out the virtual door or to just leave quietly.

 

@Michael Hewett if something has happened to a member it's likely that nobody will know, or care, about internet groups they have been part of. It's only those who come back after a break who may decide to say why they were absent.

 

Only a suggestion but perhaps if you decide for whatever reason to leave a forum it might be an idea to private message if you can, those that you have specifically conversed with and let them know you won’t be contributing for a while. You don’t need to give an explanation if you don’t want to.

 

Sometimes it better to not give an explanation…..”least said soonest mended!”

 

I can't help thinking that if the women's pension age was delayed, the majority would have carried on working and therefore had the opportunity of saving more towards their retirement or am I missing something?

Anybody who relies solely on their state pension is in for a nasty shock.

What does bug me is that the millions who retired before 2016 (i.e. the big bulk of the post war generation) gets a much smaller state pension than those who retired after that date and there's been absolutely no mention of a gradual increase so our pensions catch up.

 

If I decide to take a break from forums, as I do occasionally, (because they tend to get on my nerves sometimes - i.e. the forum itself, not the members) I write a short comment saying that I'm taking a break and will be back when I feel ready. I do it so that people who may wonder where I am are lot left worrying. Other people don't care how their sudden disappearance worries others.
I know it isn't my business why they've left but I tend to worry about people ... and everything else actually. It's just the way I am

 

I retired just one month before the change in the pension rules and have therefore 'lost' thousands of pounds since. I'm male so it isn't only women affected by pension changes, not that it makes it any better for WASPI women.

 

A sentiment I whole heartedly agree with. Not on this forum, but the number of times I've seen posts along the lines of "I'm sick of all the rudeness/arguing/unhelpful comments so I'm leaving". It may come as a shock but 99% of the time nobody would even notice they have gone.

 

If it’s a small, “private” forum (ie where you can only read posts if signed in), I would definitely not just drop out without a word, as people would worry. With larger ones (eg the ebay community, or Giffgaff), which tend to be less close knit, then I might just stroll away.

 

@lizzie27, the pension delay hurt some woman more than others. Those who were unwell but struggling on, those who died between the ages of 60-66, therefore getting nothing for all their contributions, and those who needed to stop work to care for an elderly parent or older disabled partner suffered. Then there are those made redundant in their 50s and unable to find (or secure) replacement posts, those caring for grandchildren (due to various circumstances), and so on.

Because women do a huge amount of “work” outside of formal employment, working full-time to 66 is not always a feasible option.