Overpaid Self Employment Tax, but they wont pay it back?

mrchimps

I have had statement through saying I have over paid £2176 on my self employed tax, I have called hmrc today and they say there is a repayment block on my account and basically fobbed me off saying 'we have to send it to another department to see if they can remove the block'

Any one have any ideas?

Any help appreciated

PlutoinCapricorn

Repayment block? I have never heard of that. For self-assessment, they ask you for your bank account details if you have paid too much tax so that they can transfer it directly into your bank account. If you file online, the refund comes within a few weeks.

Have you given them this information?

mrkbrrws

Apparently some repayments are being delayed while security checks are done.

This might be where its being held up? I don't know if it helps, but their address is:

The Repayment Security Team,
AASNIU,
HMRC,
101 Victoria Street,
Bristol,
BS1 6BG

whitewitch21

I would ask them for more information - ask them to explain what they mean by "block" and why it is there. If you received self employed income under CIS i think the repayment can be delayed while they verify the amount of tax deducted you put on your tax return. I would deffo ring back for more details though. Good luck

Pennywise

This is a very common problem at the moment. The last 2/3 months have seen large numbers of relatively large repayments being held back but HMRC aren't being very open about why they're doing it. There've been threads about it on the www.accountingweb.co.uk and other forums. It seems that no-one (outside HMRC and probably few within HMRC) have actually found out what the problem is. Anecdotal evidence suggests that repayments for less than a few hundred pounds are coming through quickly as normal but around £1000 and upwards seem to get stuck somewhere. I've been harrassing them since February for £7k worth of repayments for a husband/wife client and the money only arrived last week. Also, if you apply online for a refund, you get a message saying to wait a couple of days for verification, but if you login again a few days later, the request has mysteriously vanished and you have to apply again, for the same to happen. It wouldn't surprise me if HMRC have been targetted again by organised criminal gangs (like the tax credits fiasco) and have had to suspend their automated processes so that a human being can "press the button" for larger refunds - it's a shame they never bother telling people about what they're doing - by keeping quiet all they do is create more work for themselves as more and more people phone and write to try to get something done. All I can suggest is that you keep harrassing them, phoning and writing, until your request gets through to someone who's able to do something about it.