Told overpaid but heard nothing else

bootman

In Septemeber I had the dreaded letter to say I had been overpaid The child element of the WTC. This is all I am entitled to.

I am no longer entitled to any which if fine and I know.

The letter said they will be in touch shortly to say how it is to be paid back. £400.00. I have not heard a thing from them since.

I am not calling them, If they want it they can tell me how and when to pay.

Do they have a back log? Is it usual for them to take so long to tell people how to pay it back? :rolleyes:

Fran

You could ask Citizens Advice to calculate how much the tax credits should have been. Are you sure you were overpaid in the end?

CIS

It can take months for them to get back in touch, I know from experience.

They will not forget and in the current climate of them refusing to give any leeway in the decision, even if it was not your fault, ie: official error, You will still be asked for it back.

bootman

Thanks for the replies. If they can take months thats fine by me! I can get Christmas out the way perhaps first.
I know that they are correct. My husband took a new job at the start of the year with a good payrise. His Jan Feb March paypackets took us over the limit for the childrens element so under their rules which I think are unfair we will have to repay the whole award for that tax year. Even though for 9 months we were entitled to it.

black-saturn

Was it their mistake or yours? If it was theirs you are entitled to keep it, only they wont tell you that.

CIS

The problem with overpayments is that you have to be unaware that an overpayment was in payment.(how do you prove it ?)

I got stung with this because they carried on paying wrongly for 3 months after numerous calls/online corrections they finally stopped.My appeal was dismissed as they said I was aware an overpayment was being made (obviously,or I couldn't tell them) and that therefore I knew my award notice was wrong(again, obviously, as they kept using the wrong details).

The 02/03 yr I had an overpayment caused by them written off without even telling me (it appeared and then disappeared from the award notices).

I contacted my MP but haven't hear anything for the last month or so.

You've more chance of getting blood out a stone then an overpayment written off, these days.

They recover overpayments as they realise it doesn't look good to cost all that money, what they don't seem to realise is that if they got things right they wouldn't need to recover. With other benefits,if its an official error,its non-recoverable.

elaine373

bootman wrote:

Thanks for the replies. If they can take months thats fine by me! I can get Christmas out the way perhaps first.
I know that they are correct. My husband took a new job at the start of the year with a good payrise. His Jan Feb March paypackets took us over the limit for the childrens element so under their rules which I think are unfair we will have to repay the whole award for that tax year. Even though for 9 months we were entitled to it.

Surely that works out that you pay back the excess of what you earnt whether it was 1 month or 10 of what u were entitled to??? coz its about how much over during the tax year (If you know what i mean)

fatblokexl

which tax year was the overpayment from?
if it was 05-06 (this current year) then they won't ask for any back until you declare your income for this year (which will only happen after april 06, renewals).
any other tax year (03-04,04-05) they will reduce any money you are entitled to at this time and recover it bit by bit.
you will only get a notice to pay if you have no further entitlement.

bootman

The tax office must be reading my post. Payment slip arrived today. They sent one addressed to me and one to my husband both with a slip to pay at the bottom. That I feel is naughty as it looks like we both owe when in fact it is only once!!!

System

The IR always send out individual notifications to both claimants to ensure they both see how awards are made up and what information was used to calculate the award. The same goes for overpayments.

As elaine373 said, your entitlement for a tax year is based on the total income for that year. If your joint yearly income breaches the threshold for non-entitlement (approx £56,000) then unfortunately an overpayment will ensue. Your award for the tax year in question would have indicated when the IR needed to be notified of any changes in your total income.