Claiming back tax from parental contributions?

laurenced

This might be a long shot, but since students don't pay tax (like charities), can we claim back the income tax our parents pay when they give us support cash, like the Gift Aid scheme allows charities to?

It's worth 22p for every pound so it's not to be sniffed at. Anyone know if this is possible?

Cheers

-laurenced

surfcat

no .

Savvy_Sue

surfcat wrote:

no .

How did you get away with such a short answer? Thought it had to be minimum 10 characters?

Anyway, you're right, I think at one time other relatives - especially grandparents - COULD Gift Aid what they gave, not sure whether it's still possible or not. A trawl around the HMRC website might give the answer if that's at all relevant to you.

I really wouldn't advise trying to move money around within the family if it IS still possible, I'd expect HMRC to check fairly carefully to avoid abuse ...

laurenced

Savvy_Sue wrote:

How did you get away with such a short answer? Thought it had to be minimum 10 characters?

Anyway, you're right, I think at one time other relatives - especially grandparents - COULD Gift Aid what they gave, not sure whether it's still possible or not. A trawl around the HMRC website might give the answer if that's at all relevant to you.

I really wouldn't advise trying to move money around within the family if it IS still possible, I'd expect HMRC to check fairly carefully to avoid abuse ...

I had a look around the site before asking here, but a) it's an extremely unintuitive website and b) i studied taxation two years ago and the website still makes my skin crawl.

Thanks for the replies, even if one of them wasn't substantiated. Worth a try I guess. I get a small (£50) monthly payment from my mum and I was wondering if I could turn it into something bigger. Just have to keep with the high interest savings account! grim

Charlton_Taz

nope! Students do pay tax anyway. They don't usually actually pay any tax as they don't earn enough within the tax year to exceed the personal allowance of approx. £5,035.

welf_man

Good idea - but no.

Back in the days of universal grants and parental contributions, parents could "covenant" money to students, which made it eligible for tax relief. This was done away with by that nice Mrs. Thatcher.

Incidentally, students are liable for income earned during vacations only, if it exceeds the tax allowance in force at the time.

Mel.

melancholly

welf_man wrote:

Incidentally, students are liable for income earned during vacations only, if it exceeds the tax allowance in force at the time.

not true (unfortunately!)

anyone (including students) who earns over the threshold (£5035) has to pay tax. but, if you are student who only works in the holidays and won't earn over that limit then you can fill out P38 so that you aren't taxed at all. the other option would be to wait until the end of the year and claim it back. if you work during term time you are more likely to earn over £5035, and like any other person anything above that will be taxed (as Charltan Taz said). if you got an amazing summer job and earnt more than that, the extra would be taxed too.

see the HM Revenue & Customs website - it's actually very easy to navigate your way around and there are so many urban myths about students and tax that it's worth being clear about where you stand.

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/taxandu/saw_index.htm