I discovered serious mistakes on my p45, what shoud i do!?

april429

I am in the process to claim back overpaid tax during my employment with my current employer( employer A). i started my employment with them half way through the tax year. i am sure i paid too much tax as i had my tax deducted on emergency tax code. To support my claim I am required by hmrc to provide a complete record of personal earnings and income tax I have paid during the last tax year.however, i left my previous employer (employer without being given a p45, Therefore, I asked B to issue me a p45. i only worked there for one month, starting from mid july 2008 and leaving in mid Augst 2008. Although i can't be sure how much exactly i was paid by them, it couldn't be anything more than 1000.00. Now i have received my p45 the other day and the total gross pay shows to be 3367.00 and total tax to be 0.00, what even more ridiculous is that the leaving date shown on the p45 is 28 March 2009! and the section of "week/month numbers" is blank. With this incorrect total gross pay, I would end up exceeding my personal allowance by a large number and would need to pay more tax instead of claiming anything back. i am seriously doubt if there is something nasty going on with this employer B! Can anyone tell me what i should do next! thanks!

trevormax

Have you spoken to emplyer B and told them you think they have filled in the P45 wrong?

You could phone HMRC and tell them you believe employer B has made a mistake and see what they say.

Hoddie_2

At what section of the P45 from Employer B does it show gross pay to be 3367? Is it 'to date' or 'in this employment'? If it's 'to date' it's showing you the pay you had from them added to the pay from any employer or Jobseekers/Incapacity Benefit claim between April and July when you joined them.

The leaving date is often wrong on P45s as many employers keep you on the payroll for months after you leave. Some do it legitimately (such as agencies who believe you might return for more work) but many do it out of laziness. You most probably paid emergency tax at Employer A because you didn't have your P45 from Employer B to give them.

The important thing is that the income and tax deducted shown in the 'in this employment' section is correct.

april429

Hoddie wrote: »

At what section of the P45 from Employer B does it show gross pay to be 3367? Is it 'to date' or 'in this employment'? If it's 'to date' it's showing you the pay you had from them added to the pay from any employer or Jobseekers/Incapacity Benefit claim between April and July when you joined them.

The leaving date is often wrong on P45s as many employers keep you on the payroll for months after you leave. Some do it legitimately (such as agencies who believe you might return for more work) but many do it out of laziness. You most probably paid emergency tax at Employer A because you didn't have your P45 from Employer B to give them.

The important thing is that the income and tax deducted shown in the 'in this employment' section is correct.

Thanks, trevormax and hoddie.

3367 is " total pay in this employment". Before I started my current work with A in October 2008, my employment with B was the only job i had, and i was't receiving any benefits. i was in full time education before started working with B. Not only did i left my employment with B without p45 but i even didn't have a pay slip from B that's why i couldn't remeber the precise earnings with B, but i am sure it's no more than 1000.

I chased up B several times to get them send me this P45 which i now found seriously wrong. So it is not something i particularly enjoy to contact them again. I really think they are up to something, maybe tax evasion.

pelirocco

Do you have any payslips? , these should have a running total of pay and tax paid to date on them .
I doubt they are up to tax evasion , if they have overstated your pay , they will have paid too much PAYE !

Sucker_for_sweeties

pelirocco wrote: »

Do you have any payslips? , these should have a running total of pay and tax paid to date on them .
I doubt they are up to tax evasion , if they have overstated your pay , they will have paid too much PAYE !

OP says GrossPay 3K and tax deducted 0.00. So ER hasn't deducted and paid over any tax, but I agree they probably paid more ER's NI if they are overstating the OP's gross pay, and recorded it as such on the P11 and P32.

I can't see any advantage for the ER here in overstating your pay OP, but then I can't think of any reason why the gross pay isn't correct (am I too naive?)

Your only option here is to find your payslips (incidentaly never ever throw them away, I once worked for a company for around 8mths and they never paid the IR any of the tax and NI they deducted from me, so to get my full years NI logged correctly with IR I had to send in my payslips)
As they have claimed your leaving date as pre tax year end April 2009 (even tho they didn't issue the P45 until October 2009 !?!), you won't have received a P60 from them.
Maybe trawl your bank statements for the wages pay in amounts, if you can't find your payslips.

april429

i was not given one..
the way they try to avoid tax could be complicated, i don't know how! maybe they give hmrc false information on the number of employees they are hiring hence they could pay less tax through paye, however, they still need to pay the worker salary, they need to be able to explain every single spending occured. that's where the extra 2000 comes in use. this 2000 would have been paid to other employees who the employer B is not paying any tax for.

Hoddie_2

If it is fraud on their part it's often very difficult to prove. If they've inflated your wages in order to pay someone else without deducting tax from them, that might explain why they've kept you on their books for so long (they can spread the 'payments' over a longer period in order to avoid paying National Insurance).

Regarding the lack of payslips, they have a legal duty to provide you with payslips but only once you've asked for them. You could contact ACAS regarding this though I'm not sure how much help they'd be.

If this company paid you by cheque or direct bank transfer, you could always show your bank statements to HMRC when disputing the P45 figures, but again I'm not sure whether they'd even be interested in trying to help you prove the company has inflated your wages. If you were paid in cash you're pretty much stitched up.

HMRC would have received something from this employer at the end of the tax year telling them how much the company paid each employee, and how much tax and National Insurance was deducted. If you're lucky it might simply be that the employer made an error on the P45 and that HMRC hold the correct information already from the company's end-of-year returns.

Golden rule is always to ensure you get a payslip.

april429

Hoddie wrote: »

If it is fraud on their part it's often very difficult to prove. If they've inflated your wages in order to pay someone else without deducting tax from them, that might explain why they've kept you on their books for so long (they can spread the 'payments' over a longer period in order to avoid paying National Insurance).

Regarding the lack of payslips, they have a legal duty to provide you with payslips but only once you've asked for them. You could contact ACAS regarding this though I'm not sure how much help they'd be.

If this company paid you by cheque or direct bank transfer, you could always show your bank statements to HMRC when disputing the P45 figures, but again I'm not sure whether they'd even be interested in trying to help you prove the company has inflated your wages. If you were paid in cash you're pretty much stitched up.

HMRC would have received something from this employer at the end of the tax year telling them how much the company paid each employee, and how much tax and National Insurance was deducted. If you're lucky it might simply be that the employer made an error on the P45 and that HMRC hold the correct information already from the company's end-of-year returns.

Golden rule is always to ensure you get a payslip.

Thanks Hoddie!

i hope it was simply an error. if it is not I just wondered how employer B would get away with it for so many years! dose the government know about this situation. I admit that i really lack of necessary knowlege to protect myself at the fist place, partially because i am an foreigner and this was my first job ever. i really learned a lesson.

laurel7172

Is it a printed P45, or a manual one (written by hand)? IIRC, some payroll software is rather reluctant to issue a P45 after the end of the tax year in question. So if it has been done by hand, or forced through on an override, it's far more likely to be bodged. It's also the sort of job that gets given to the new office junior, who wouldn't know the difference between gross pay and gross stupidity.

april429

laurel7172 wrote: »

Is it a printed P45, or a manual one (written by hand)? IIRC, some payroll software is rather reluctant to issue a P45 after the end of the tax year in question. So if it has been done by hand, or forced through on an override, it's far more likely to be bodged. It's also the sort of job that gets given to the new office junior, who wouldn't know the difference between gross pay and gross stupidity.

it's a printed one..