Tax credits dropped from £500+ to £42 - help!

melly1980

blades_man wrote: »

Your "rant" is uncalled for and has probably already offended several forum members.

As far as I can see there was no rant nor was there anything offensive in there.

blades_man wrote: »

The fact is; if your earnings went up to £43000 a year there is no way you should be getting £500 per month tax credit!!! You are almost saying that you should be given the £500 child tax credit to fund your lifestyle choice!

As pointed out hundreds of times on this thread, EVERYONE who gets tax credits gets an amount based on last years earnings. That means if you get a sudden large payrise / promotion you will have a brucy bonus year followed by a whopping drop. The tax credits given are calculated on the previous years circumstances.

blades_man wrote: »

I earn £40000 per year and we have had only £41 per month child tax credit for years (which has now stopped)!

The difference is that the person you quoted had over 800 quid in childcare fees. Those fees were probably the main reason for getting so much tax credits for that year. If you get only 41 quid that will be because you probably have only 1 child so your child element has been tapered away and you get the bog standard family element of 500 quid (or 40 odd a month) with no childcare fees.

I absoultely guarentee you that your 40K per year for one child with no childcare fees will give you a much greater amount of money to spend per month than the OP's 45 - 47K in which they have to spend >800 per month on childcare.

blades_man wrote: »

This forum has made me realise that there are some big earners out there (£30000+) who are still receiving large child tax credits! It makes me want to pack up work and claim every benefit I can!

Ultimately you will be better off by earning more rather than claiming tax credits. Whether you think the amount extra you get is worth it or not is another matter.

zagfles

pensionworrier wrote: »

I do not understand why some apparently high earners -in terms of tax credits (I always thought high earners were those with individual incomes over £30k and not those with joint incomes of equilvalent amount!) are still receiving tc when I am not. Other posts have stated that those families over £42k will still get some tc - my letter received yesterday did not say I was entitled to anything. I thought at least I would get a small amount towards childcare cost but nothing! If it is available and I am entitled I will go for it as I have worked non-stop since I was 16 and all the way through uni paying my taxes and don't think my family should miss out because I chose to aim higher in terms of my career (which by the way is still paid lower than national average for a graduate which is way below the London average) - however since I am lucky to still have a job whilst those around me lose theirs I will collect what I can.

Whether you get any or not depends on your circumstances. What is your income (gross annual)? Childcare costs? Number of kids? Hours worked? Any disabilites?

Sorry if you posted them already - might have got lost amonst all the clueless ranting which seems to make up 90% of this thread

StormyWeather_2

duchy wrote: »

It can also mean 2 parents working opposing shifts so able to share a car -one minding the children whilst the other works and vv so no childcare costs,

I don't think you need to be a parent to need clothes for work though-I think you'll find that applies to non parents too ! Nothing to do with having children at all.

duchy, I was making the point that the family with the second income, is likely to have more outgoings than the one income family. There's the obvious such as childcare, but then travel and clothes etc all add up.

StormyWeather_2

skcollobcat10 wrote: »

That was another ridiculous idea from this government what was ever stopping them going to a library? Free computers indeed, if they were on JSA, they should have got off the a**es and got a job to pay for one.

The laptop was for the children to use not the parents. I don't know if you've tried booking time at the library to use the computers. We tried a while ago, I wanted to use the printer as mine wasn't working. It was all booked up.

shop-to-drop

StormyWeather wrote: »

duchy, I was making the point that the family with the second income, is likely to have more outgoings than the one income family. There's the obvious such as childcare, but then travel and clothes etc all add up.

Remember though a family with two incomes has 2 tax free allowances so pays considerably less tax. Especially if the 2 incomes are basic rate tax payers and the one income is a high rate tax payer. In addition the family with one high rate tax payer will lose child benefit next year.

pensionworrier

zagfles wrote: »

Whether you get any or not depends on your circumstances. What is your income (gross annual)? Childcare costs? Number of kids? Hours worked? Any disabilites?

Sorry if you posted them already - might have got lost amonst all the clueless ranting which seems to make up 90% of this thread

joint gross is £43k cildcare at £700per month 1 kid I work officially 38hrs/week & husband 42hrs/week - childcare is very expensive and we have grandparent help one day a week so I hate to think what other peoples cost are without support of extended family and/or more kids

zagfles

pensionworrier wrote: »

joint gross is £43k cildcare at £700per month 1 kid I work officially 38hrs/week & husband 42hrs/week - childcare is very expensive and we have grandparent help one day a week so I hate to think what other peoples cost are without support of extended family and/or more kids

No you won't get any, mainly because you have just the one child. Have another and you'll get some

Elements you're entitled to http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rates/taxcredits.htm :

1920+1950+790+2555+545+700*12*0.7 = 13640

Income taper: (43000-6420)*0.41 = 14997

Taper is higher than elements.

Can you get childcare vouchers through work? You pay for them via salary sacrifice so you save tax and NI. Most employers do them as it saves them NI.

In fact if you do this and sacrifice at least £3000 between you for childcare vouchers, you'll then be entitled to the family element of tax credits ie £545 a year!

evenasus

neil277 wrote: »

How did people use to cope years ago without credit cards and tax credits, the benefits today have spoiled people

We lived within our means.

We met our future husbands/wives - got engaged - saved for three years, for the deposit for a house - then married - then had children.

People today do things the wrong way round.

moneypanicker

I only ever received basic tax credits £42 a month? When i had baby no 3 i had the whole year off as a result last year we qualified for some some extra tax credits and some help with childcare. We only had baby no 3 as we could afford it! When we found out that we were entitled to this money we rang them several times to confirm - just to check.

We knew that we only qualified because our 09/10 income was much lower than other years and that this year we wouldn't get much or anything. I've reapplied for childcare vouchers 10 days ago and i'm glad as we received the letter yesterday saying that we were going from £420 a month to £0.

We did have doubts about taking this money and i know i'll get shot down for saying this but we decided that if they are offering we'll take. We looked at it as an extra help for a year but i certainly didn't expect it to continue. We earn 45k. 09/10 32k.

teabag29

evenasus wrote: »

We lived within our means.

We met our future husbands/wives - got engaged - saved for three years, for the deposit for a house - then married - then had children.

People today do things the wrong way round.

Yes but bear in mind 'back in the day' when there was no financial assistance from the government women were often trapped in abusive relationships as they had no finances to build a life of there own