RetireJapan

I was in pretty much the same situation a few years ago. Firstly, I agree with Adamu about the quoted back payments. The letter should be correct if you've been accepted for class 2 rates. Don't expect your government gateway account to be updated to reflect that any time soon though, if ever. In th...

It's annoying isn't it!
The last time I called up HMRC I was told that the direct debit may be canceled if there is any unassigned money sitting in your NI account, so it's probably a good idea to call up soon after making any back payments.
Doesn't sound like that is the case for you though.

In the unlikely event that the interest rate on your loan rises enough to become a problem in the future , you can then use the money that you saved/invested to pay the mortgage. I guess the counter point would be "what would you do if a sudden interest rate rise coincides with a significant d...

A few months for a first reply seems to be typical. (Keep in mind that it probably takes about a month between any action being taken by HMRC and a letter about it reaching you in Japan). I’m not sure if there is any point contacting them by phone while waiting for an initial reply unless it is taki...

We've moved a couple of times with Sakai and they seemed organized and professional both times. Expect to negotiate a bit on price. For example, you might be offered a lower price if you accept on the spot (especially if they know you are looking at other companies) or are more flexible with timing....

That Nissay link is an example of a life insurance company. My understanding is that whole life insurance policies are not a good deal, because they are basically making investments on your behalf, and keeping a large difference as a fee. Better to do the investment part yourself, and if you need l...

So I've gone through what seems to be the standard, slow procedure for making UK pension contributions: 1) apply to make contributions 2) receive reply several months later saying I'd been accepted for class 2 3) transfer money to make up shortfall for unpaid years 4) phone up to get those payments ...

I was recently accepted for class 2. Again, the waiting time was about 14 weeks. I left for Japan straight after university but my penultimate year at university was spend working in industry meaning that I had one full year of NI contributions in addition to three non-working years. I assume that w...

As another reference point, my company recently started a "selection type" DC plan where they contribute 1,000 per month and then employees can add up to 26,000 per month. They also contribute to another pension scheme for us, which I assume is why the upper limit is reduced to 27,000 per ...

This is for a completely different area of the country (Fukuoka), but these are the subsidies/tax breaks that we received. (1) Housing loan tax deduction (max. of 400,000 per year for 10 years) (2) Flat 35 interest rate reduction (0.25% reduction for 10 years for meeting certain building standards (...