Hi Tom,
Yeah, I have recently got a letter saying that I haven;t made any contributions for the year 03/04. To be entitled for a full pension I need to pay them about 350 quid. To me this is a lot of money and I am not convinced there will be a pension at the end of it. Am tempted to pay to be on the safe side and also open a private pension as well. The leaflets that came with this letter were not very useful. I think our research councils should provide us with some info on this.