Tom McPhail, pensions expert at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "The chancellor's decision to freeze the maximum savings element of pension credit will cause a significant cut in retirement income for about one in six pensioners".
And the savings credit element of pension credit would be retained.
What will happen to bank levies, or the private element of the pension system, also remains unclear.
The guarantee element of the pension credit will rise by £4 to £109.45 for a single person and by £6.10 £167.05 a week for a couple in the next financial year.
And while some free services are just age related, others are means-tested and only available to those who claim the credit element of the pension credit, income support or income-based jobs seekers allowance.
The savings from higher pension ages are, on average, offset by other elements of the pensions becoming more generous".
While he does not strictly need to get the Bundesrat's approval for the main elements of the pension plans, the chancellor does need its consent for his proposed tax incentives to encourage contributions to supplementary private pensions.
"I will have no income this tax year so my plan was to take the tax-free element of my Aviva pension pot along with a third of the remaining capital in each of the next three tax years.
"But we believe we can show that this contribution has all the elements of a pension".
Some of the most important elements of a pension conversion also pose the most vexing accounting issues.
