At the beginning of October, a system started to allow people who are up to 10 years in arrears on premium payments for the kokumin nenkin pension to pay the unpaid premiums. Kokumin nenkin mainly covers self-employed or jobless people, but also serves as the basic pension for corporate workers. The deferred payment system will be in force for three years. To reduce the number of pensionless people or people eligible to receive only a fraction of full pension benefits, the government must make people aware of the new system.
In principle, kokumin nenkin is based on the idea that people pay the premiums for 40 years from the age of 20 to the age of 60 to get the full benefits. They have to pay premiums for 25 years or longer to qualify to receive a pension. The deferred payment system is designed to help people whose accumulated payment period is less than 25 years or who want to increase their pension benefits because their accumulated payment period is less than 40 years.
It covers the following three groups — people between age 20 and 60 who failed to pay premiums within the past 10 years; people between 60 and 65 who are trying to achieve the 25-year payment requirement but are in arrears (optional participation) and people between 65 and 70 who are also trying to fulfill the 25-year payment requirement but are in arrears (special optional participation).