Tax Refund with partial JSA

mr1974

Hello forum,

I have been reading about taxes and allowances etc., and I came up with some calculation, but I am not sure about a number of issues...

My circumstances:
During the 2004-2005 tax year I have been on Job Seeker's Allowance 05/04/2003 - 17/02/2004. I then started working at a rate of £28000 PA gross.

Following are my calculations on the income for the 2003-2004 tax year. I am not including Housing Benefit as I understand it be non taxable.

P60 from Employment Service states I have been paid £2482 for the 05/04/2003 - 17/02/2004 period.
Employer P60 states I have been paid £2800 for the 17/02/2004 - 05/04/2004 period.
Total = £5282

On my my employer's P60 it states that taxes for the 17/02/2004 - 05/04/2004 period are £408.20. It sounds strange I only paid £408.20 on £2800 (14.5%?). Why is this?

I am almost certainly I can ask for tax back, as I have a non-taxable allowance of £4615. I should only pay the basic 22% on the remaining £667, which is £146.74. This means I should get back £ 261.46.


For National insurance contributions, in my employer's P60, my earnings are subdivided like this:
Earnings at the LEL = £668
Earnings above the LEL, up to ET = £102
Earnings above ET = £2026

Also, for National insurance contributions, in my employer's P60:
Employee's contributions = £223.30

Can I ask for national insurance contributions back?

Comments welcome,
MR

Milarky

mr1974,

You can't get a refund of national insurance unless the employer has made a mistake in the first place. The right amount of NI will be 11% of earnings above the ET which your P60 says is £2026. 11% of £2026 is 222.86 [So their deduction looks correct]. Only if they have applied your earnings over the a different period [e.g. too 'short' or too 'long'] will the amount of NI due change. Assuming they got your period of earnings right there shouls be nothing to claim back [sorry]

The 'good' news however is that you should pay even less tax than you reckon as you forgot about the 10% [about £1960 at 10%, I beleive] before the 22% rate kicks in. If your income is just £667 about your personal allowance then that will be £66.70 rather than £146.74 [as you worked out] and you should get a larger rebate than you thought.

Remember to include any taxable interest too from that year when you claim. I'm assuming you had some savings [maybe not!] and didn't get interest gross on these at the time. If you paid tax on this income too, that would have been at 20% and I think [if I am right] that you would get 10% rebate there also since your income is in the 10% 'band' still

Regards

M

mr1974

Needless to say I appreciate your suggestions.

The outstanding issue is the £408.20 tax paid on £2800 earnings 14.5%?): do you know why is this? How does the employer calculates howmuch tax you've got to pay? I mean he cannot know what your other earning have been/will be for the year, so it assumes earnings pro-rata for the year, doesn't it? How about allowances? Does he take that into account?

Thanks again!
MR