last years income

Folio

I notice that all forms for benefits want to know your income for the previous tax year. How does this work please? If you have earned say £29,000the previous tear then lose your job you don't have all of that saved up to use - it's been spent on living...so how can they award benefits and tax credits based on this? never had to actually clain anything before so am totally at sea here and it all all looks very scary and unfair to me

DreamerV

For tax credits only:

They base it INITIALLY on previous year income (usually the last full year you will actually have records for) BUT once the award is processed and on the systems, then you can phone and give your current year estimate - they will base your payments on the lesser of the 2 incomes; previous year actual and current year estimate. Relying on people to estimate is a bit of a problem, as people seem to underestimate a lot and not take into account overtime, bonuses, etc, etc. Also if people lose a job, when giving a current year estimate they seem to only count from april till they lost their job, even when looking for another job. In effect, this tends to mean when they get a job, their amount for year will be more than they estimate so they will already have been overpaid. This is why basing on previous year is better in general....it gives a degree of certainty over payments without relying on people estimating.