What happens to your pension when you live in Ireland?
The payments follow you without trouble. The tax is where it gets interesting: the UK-Ireland convention treats the State Pension, a workplace pension and a civil service pension in different ways.
One convention, three kinds of pension
The basic rule of the UK-Ireland convention is the usual one: pensions are taxed in the country of residence, that is, in Ireland. It makes one exception, and it concerns a pension many British families carry: the pension for work in the service of the state.
| Pension | Provision | Taxed in |
|---|---|---|
| UK State Pension | Article 17 or Article 20 | Ireland |
| Workplace and personal pensions, annuities | Article 17 | Ireland |
| Pensions for UK government service, including state-funded teaching | Article 18(2) and (3) | the UK; Ireland only if you are resident in Ireland and an Irish citizen |
Pensions for services in connection with a business carried on by the state follow Article 17 like any workplace pension (Article 18(4)).
Source: UK-Ireland convention, Articles 17, 18 and 20 (HMRC consolidated text on GOV.UK); HMRC Employment Income Manual EIM75070 (updated 3 November 2026) on the State Pension under tax treaties. As of: read 6 November 2026.
This table is the reason we do not treat pensions as one question. For a couple who both draw the State Pension and a company pension, the move looks entirely different in tax terms from a couple where one of them spent thirty years in the civil service. Retirement in Ireland as a whole, from the pension to healthcare to the cost of living, is touched on by our German-language sister site Ruhestand im Ausland in its overview of Ireland.
The State Pension: paid in Ireland, taxed there
The State Pension can be claimed from abroad, within four months of reaching State Pension age, through the International Pension Centre. And it keeps its value: GOV.UK says it increases each year if you live in the European Economic Area, Gibraltar, Switzerland or a country with a social security agreement with the UK. Ireland, as a member of the EU, is one of them.
On tax, GOV.UK is plain: non-residents do not usually pay UK tax on the State Pension. The convention gives the reason. HMRC’s own manual says the State Pension is not a government pension and may fall under the pensions article or the article on other income of a treaty. In the UK-Ireland convention both lead to the same place: Article 17 assigns pensions for past employment to the country of residence, and Article 20 assigns income the convention does not name elsewhere to it as well. Either way, the State Pension of a resident of Ireland is taxed in Ireland.
If you read that the British State Pension stays taxable in Britain, that is GOV.UK’s rule for someone who lives abroad but is still classed as UK resident for tax. It is a question of residence, not of the address the pension is paid to.
Workplace and personal pensions
Article 17 of the convention covers pensions and similar payments for past employment, together with annuities, and says they are taxable only in the country of residence. A company pension, a personal pension drawn as income or an annuity paid to a resident of Ireland is therefore Irish taxable income, not British.
What the convention says and what the pension provider deducts are two different things. A British provider runs the pension through PAYE and deducts UK tax until HMRC tells it otherwise. The way there is HMRC’s claim form for individuals resident in a treaty country, which, according to HMRC’s own manual, serves exactly this purpose: claiming relief on the UK State Pension, UK pensions, purchased annuities, interest or royalties. HMRC expects a new form for every new source of income.
One thing this page does not settle: how Ireland treats a lump sum taken from a British pension. That depends on the kind of scheme and the form of the payment, and it belongs answered before the lump sum is drawn, not afterwards.
Government pensions and the passport
Article 18, in the wording of the 1998 Protocol, takes pensions for government service out of the general rule. A pension paid by the UK, a part of it or a local authority for services in the discharge of functions of a governmental nature is taxable only in the UK. The same applies, under paragraph 3, to the pension of someone employed at an educational institution paid directly or wholly or mainly from state funds.
The exception to the exception sits in paragraph 2(b): such a pension is taxable only in Ireland if the person is both resident in Ireland and an Irish citizen. For a former civil servant or a teacher at a state-funded school who lives in Ireland as a British citizen, the pension therefore stays British for tax. Whoever later takes Irish citizenship moves it to Ireland; how that works, and why the British passport can be kept alongside, is on our pages on naturalisation and dual citizenship.
That is no reason to apply for a passport, but it is a reason to know which pension is which. HMRC’s manual on Ireland carries its own chart of the cases, by nationality and by where the services were performed. The State Pension, as above, is not a government pension.
Your National Insurance record from Ireland
How much State Pension you will receive depends on your National Insurance record, and the record does not stop mattering when you leave. Since the tax year 2026 to 2027, HMRC’s guidance NI38 says, periods abroad can be filled only with voluntary Class 3 contributions.
For periods abroad from 6 April 2026 there is a condition: you lived in the UK for a continuous ten-year period before the period you want to pay for, or you paid ten years of contributions before going abroad, or you paid Class 1 contributions for the first 52 weeks of a job abroad. Before that date three years were enough. NI38 also notes that the social security agreement with Ireland can be used in certain circumstances.
Whether paying in from Ireland is worth it is a calculation for each record, and one worth making before the State Pension is claimed.
The practical side: what you apply for in Ireland
The tax question is one half. The other decides everyday life: health cover, public transport and the benefits Ireland gives people in retirement. Many of them depend not on Irish contribution years but on age and on your living in Ireland for good.
Health cover through the S1
If you draw only a UK State Pension and do not work in Ireland, the UK can pay for your healthcare in Ireland. The bridge is the S1 form, which you request from the NHS Overseas Healthcare Services up to 90 days before the move. Readers from the Nordics and the Benelux receive it from the institution that insures them at home. The details are on our page on health cover when you leave.
In Ireland you hand in the S1 together with the application for the medical card at the HSE. Whoever comes through the S1 receives it without a means test, and with it the GP, hospital and medicines of the public system are open, also to dependants who do not work in Ireland. That holds as long as the pension from home stays the only one: whoever takes up work in Ireland or later draws an Irish pension changes the responsible country.
Free Travel from 66
If you are 66 or older and live lawfully and permanently in Ireland, Free Travel lets you use public buses and trains free of charge, with no means test and no Irish contribution years. If you do not receive an Irish state pension, as is the case with a British pension alone, you apply with form FT1. Since 1 March 2026, Free Travel works only on the Public Services Card; the old paper passes are no longer valid. For the card you go once in person to an appointment where your photograph is taken. From 70, a companion may also travel with you free of charge.
Household Benefits Package from 70
From 70, the Household Benefits Package is there for everyone who lives in Ireland all year round, with no means test and no Irish pension needed: an allowance towards electricity or gas of €1.15 a day, about €35 a month, and the free television licence. Between 66 and 70 it goes to people who receive a qualifying payment, which can include an equivalent pension from an EU country, or who pass the means test. You apply with form HB1 or online through MyWelfare.
GP and medicines from 70, and without a card
From 70 there is the GP visit card with no means test, and the medical card on a gross income of up to €550 a week for a single person and €1,050 for a couple. If you have neither an S1 nor a medical card, you pay for medicines yourself, but no more than €80 a month for the whole household under the Drugs Payment Scheme. For 16 long-term conditions, among them diabetes, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease, the Long-Term Illness Scheme pays in full for the medicines for that condition, with no means test. How the Irish system works as a whole is on our page on healthcare in Ireland.
Source: gov.ie, Household Benefits Package (updated 21 October 2026) and Free Travel Scheme (7 October 2026); HSE, Medical cards for people from other EU countries; NHS, Planning your healthcare (nhs.uk); GOV.UK, Healthcare in Ireland. As of: retrieved 6 November 2026.
The order after arrival: S1 and medical card, PPS number, Public Services Card, then Free Travel and, as soon as you are entitled to it, the Household Benefits Package. If you want to go through the steps with someone who lives there, book a conversation with Marc, our Ireland guide.
Every one of these applications, the non-dom position and the home come together in the Retirement package Ireland, €7,650.
A warning on the remittance basis
To close, a point that sits exactly where this page meets Irish non-dom status, and that can become expensive.
If you use the remittance basis in Ireland and leave your pension in an account outside Ireland, you may think it stays tax-free. For a pension from Britain that is not so. The convention contains, in Article 6, “Limitation of relief”, a provision that limits British relief to the part remitted to or received in Ireland. It matters because, since 1 January 2008, the Irish remittance basis reaches British income in the first place.
For a workplace pension that means in concrete terms: the part not remitted can become taxable in Britain again, although the convention assigns the pension to Ireland. If you need the pension for life in Ireland anyway and have it paid there, you do not have this problem.
The full account, with the second clause on gains, is on our page on the remittance clause. The pension is declared in Ireland through self-assessment; registering with Revenue and the first return we take on as tax registration as a non-dom.
More in Expert knowledge
The first step is a conversation
Where your pension is taxed depends on the kind of pension and on your passport. We sort both out before the move.