CSA and tax credits

fannyanna

I'm surprised to see that the CSA take tax credits into account when assessing maintenance.

I don't know the in's and out's of how this works but could this result in the following situation?

PWC gets tax credit for child and maintenance payment from NRP (which includes an element of tax credit for another child from another relationship)?

If the above is the case it seems really wrong that child 1 benefits from two lots of tax credit (both the full amount received by the PWC and a percentage of what the NRP gets for child 2).

Hope my waffle made sense.

P.S. This is all theoretical and is not based on my current personal circumstances or anything. Just curious as to how things work having read a few posts that touch on this subject.

mrsspendalot

Yes, this is true. However, whether they actually count them or ask the NRP about them seems to be patchy and dependent on who you speak to.

I don't think it is right, and I don't think it is going to be the case under the new 'gross income' system whenever that gets introduced.

They also take childcare elements and disability elements for children into account, which I think is even worse.

fannyanna

Hang on - they can take disability benefits for child 2 and use that to pay towards child 1. That's absurd.

HelpMePay

I'd say it a bit stronger, its sick

shell_542

Yes and money given to parents to pay for childcare costs and to make it more affordable to work. They then have to pass a percentage of that onto the PWC.

fannyanna

NRPP's most love the fact that some of their childs benefit gets paid to another child.

fannyanna

shell_542 wrote: »

Yes and money given to parents to pay for childcare costs and to make it more affordable to work. They then have to pass a percentage of that onto the PWC.

Disgraceful. Don't get me wrong - if you have a kid you need to be responsible for that child (and that includes being financially responsible) but taking one childs benefits to give to another just seems really unfair.

[Deleted User]

I'm a nrpp and i've briefly posted about this on another thread, my oh has just had his assessment through from csa for his dd with ex, they didn't ask for ctc on the form they sent only wtc which i thought was fair enough, its only when Kelloggs seemed adamant that the ctc should be included as well that i have phoned csa and got oh to phone to check this as we didnt want them saying we had lied and backdating money that should have been used, 3 phonecalls to csa, twice been told they dont use ctc once been told they do?! i think it is ridiculous that the ctc that we receive for our ds is used in the calculation for oh's dd when oh's ex gets ctc for their dd anyway (and more than we get for ds)....neither I nor my partner have any problem with him paying maintenance for his dd at all but i think they way the csa work things out is stupid....

nannytone_2

it seems really unfair that the PWC can claim all the benefits and it not be affected my maintenance, but benefits from the NRP can be taken. the system is really bum's up. i never agreed with the fact that maintenance is totally disregarded when calculating benefit entitlement. i wonder how many people that got too much to be entitled to benefit before the rules changed, now claim?

kelloggs36

However, much is offset by the fact that the NRP pays less of a % if they have other children in their household - even if they aren't theirs - that isn't fair either, is it?

fannyanna

kelloggs36 wrote: »

However, much is offset by the fact that the NRP pays less of a % if they have other children in their household - even if they aren't theirs - that isn't fair either, is it?

That's a seperate issue.

I agree it is unfair to reduce the % when there’s a child in the household that is unrelated to the NRP.

However, I do not agree with this where the NRP goes on to have another child. It is right that there is a reduction.