Child Tax Credit - how much can they take?

superstressed

I'd be really grateful for some advice.....

My husband has been signed off sick for nearly 3 years (stress & depression) & following a recently requested reassessment because he has zero income, they have now decided that they deem ALL our weekly child tax credits as his income.

He has 2 children (13 + 16) with ex
We have 2 children between us (6 + 8)
We also have 2 of my children from my previous marriage living with us, that we receive child tax credits for (their father has moved abroad & pays nothing)

I work part time & receive all the working & child tax credits into my bank account, but it's a joint claim as we live together.

He has no income or savings & is unable to claim any sickness benefits due to my income.

How can they use ALL the child tax credits as his only income?
surely at the most they can use as assessed income is half of our joint claim for child tax credits?

Is it worth an appeal?

Thanks for any info......

chriszzz

I dont claim to know how csa work and will not be able to give you accurate advise. Its more a rant than anything else, so I do apologise!!!

What gets me is that your partner is off work sick, so obviously he is not earning money to provide for his other children... thats ok...if your sick then there is nothing you can do about that, but what does get me is that the csa are now looking at your ctc as income... now this is what i dont get with the csa, in my way of thinking ctc is to help your children in your household to not live in poverty yeah!!

Right now am assuming your OH ex is working and she claims ctc, and the same applies in her household ie poverty, so the csa want to use your ctc to obviously give to OH ex. Why??

This will probably cause him more depression and stress Cant a man be sick?? sometimes money just has to go on the back burner until the person is healthy again to start earning to be able to provide again.

kelloggs36

The rules state that child tax credits will always be deemed to belong to the NRP regardless of anything else so you won't win on that argument. They won't take the working tax credits into account as you are the earner, so that is now out of the equation.

LizzieS_2

I am guessing your tax credits are between £100 and £200 per week. If so he would pay £5 for the first £100pw of tax credits and 25% of anything over £100.

Everyone can argue whether it is right or wrong to include tax credits. Complaining will change nothing - better to look at it positively rather than negatively, eg if he could work the tax credits would be much less and therefore the payments received are supplementing his lack of income.

On another note, have you enquired into sickness benefits available? The benefits board have a few experts there.

superstressed

kelloggs36 wrote: »

The rules state that child tax credits will always be deemed to belong to the NRP regardless of anything else so you won't win on that argument. They won't take the working tax credits into account as you are the earner, so that is now out of the equation.

So does that really mean they can take 100% of CTC into account even though it's a joint claim? surely it's only 50%?

shell_542

superstressed wrote: »

So does that really mean they can take 100% of CTC into account even though it's a joint claim? surely it's only 50%?

Yup. They can and they do.

They only split the working tax credit if the NRPPartner earns the same as the NRP ... and they discount all working tax credit if the NRPP earns more than the NRP.

bdt1

Thanks, very interesting, just a quick question though - if the NRPP earns more than the NRP, what is the allocation of CTC, will they split it 50-50 for assessment/NRP income purposes?

shell_542

Nope. All child tax credits are taken into account apparently. Only working tax credits may be split or discounted.

Thriftysaver

I had 5 kids living at home and as one of them was only 1 at the time I stayed at home with kids. Ex got all my ctc taken into account for calculations. When OH came out of work for a few months and I was working, Yes you guessed it all my ctc was taken as his income. Thing is if I did what she did and lied to the state pretending I was a single parent thus claiming discount on ct and claiming wtc and ctc, then the csa would have been paying me for our two kids as well as her one and then they couldn't have stolen my kids tax credits and she would have got a fifth of what she gets now. Oh and by the way no I never got any from my ex and can't now he's dead. The csa is !!!!

I know I sound bitter. I am. Because we are honest people and get penalised. While she gets away with being a greedy cow and the system allows her too.

When I got divorced 11 years ago I was allowed to keep the first £15 maintenance( I didn't get any) Everything else was taken as income. Now this government has deemed that every child should not be in poverty. Really? But it's ok for my 5 to go without. Don't forget there is only a 25% disregard (because 2 don't need to eat, be clothed or bus fares and dinner monies for school) and then she gets 15%. How fair is that. Oh and just had a benefits check and we are on £30 less than income support.

It has got to be an infringement on 2nd families human rights but with this government it's all about looking good about looking after kids who have been 'abandoned' by these ne'er do well dads ( always the dad's fault not).

I'm not saying that csa shouldn't be paid. In our case it was and then some and then when you ask for some leeway, no csa him. Greedy c!w.

Pointless doing anything as csa are a law unto themselves. Surely as breach of human rights. But in this case the law is not common sense.

Rant over. Sorry. It just makes me so mad being a pwc and an nrpp.

Dancing_Shoes

I know it is hard and frustrating but by being hung up on what she does/doesn't get you are only hurting yourself. Our pwc made our lives hell but then we started to fight back and the best thing that we did was to ignore her and her silly demands etc, at the end of the day you have a husband/partner and your children. Yes it can be a struggle for alot of people and it isn't fair but when there is nothing you can do then the best thing to do is to move on. Sit down with your husband and work out how to save money in your monthly budget (there are great ideas on here) and then work out how much you are entitled to on benefits and hopefully you will find that it can be a bit easier. The thing with CSA is that there is always and end date and when this comes there is nothing the pwc can do she will have to learn to stand on her own 2 feet with no help from you. When our day comes I wouldn't even give her a £1 for a cup of tea:rotfl::rotfl: the saying is true what goes around comes around and as a result of her actions she has lost an awful lot as we were paying for alot of extras which we stopped because of her harrassment. As long as you are supporting the children (who are all that matters) then you know you are doing your bit.

Blonde_Bint

Thriftysaver, how long do you have left to go? sometimes it helped me through the worst of our pwc's sh*t, to stay focused on the date at which point she had no power over our affairs.

At present there is a lull in our storm:D with either 2 to 5 yrs left to go before its over for us (depending on if ss stays on in education). lol our car is dropping apart at the moment and DH wants to get rid of it for a nicer one and reliable :eek: not an expensive car but he wants something like an old bmw or mercedes, I dont really care what car we have if its got four wheels and an engine and its a nice colour i'm done. However, if he gets something like what he wants she'll only see that its eg a bmw and not that its a really old one and she'll start, I know she will and I cant be doing with her. I get where DH is coming from he wants to try to pay a little bit more for a car so it doesnt breakdown as much, (getting so we cant pay the repairs on it anymore). I think he should be able to just pick whatever he wants and have it, but if he does it will cost us more than the car is worth in the long run.

I just want to keep quiet plod along without attracting her attention, and then in the end he can have whatever he wants at a time when we wont suffer for it. If it helps you get through it you could do a similar thing. Every day that goes by is another day marked off.