Carers Allowance, self employment and NIC exemption

Jaycee_Dove

Okay, I spent all morning on the phone - as expected. Really to go round in circles again.

As I was told last time I called (see post 1) nobody really knows what has happened or why I got no earlier payment requests from 2009 when they stopped my direct debit payments for paying class 2.

They did note that it can take a year for the carer's allowance payment to be notified to Newcastle. But that did not explain why I was suddenly being billed for 3 outstanding six monthly sums (from April 2011 onward) as carer's allowance credit notification ought to have occurred for 2011 by now.

I was told to wait until they spoke to the appropriate person at the tax office and had to hang on for ages until they confirmed that the tax office had issued a carer's allowance credit for last year but not, as yet, for 2011-12, which was as expected.

All they could do was advise I fill out the form CF 10 and ask for it to be backdated to include 2011. They said it would then supercede the wait for notification by the carer's allowance/tax office and would be kept in effect for future years (or in actuality to May 2013 when I reach pension age and will lose CA anyway as my pension entitlement will overtake that, as I realised).

So I will submit the form and do as suggested. But if anyone else who has a small self employed income and then starts to get Carer's Allowance should read this thread - my advice is DO NOT presume the credit will get through to the NI payment office quickly enough to work.

You might still get unexpected bills like these and so fill in a CF 10 anyway as a cover for the apparently labyrinthine and slow moving wheels of government.

Incidentallty, I did realise that CF 10 form did not ask me to say when I stopped being self employed. If you read post 1 you will see that it was the NI office that told me after investigating my first call to them in May to send them a declaration of when I stopped being self employed - even though I had clearly explained the situation to them. They also claimed they had just then suspended my direct debit payments even though they had actually done that in 2009! Although they had told me on the phone that they did not stop such payments at all. Hence my utter confusion and first post on here.

Again thanks to all for the helpful advice.

sleepless_saver

How annoying for you. If you have the energy after all this unnecessary hassle, you could consider complaining to your MP. Life is difficult enough for carers as it is!

CA_Man

Carer's Allowance is a class 1

Carer's Credit is a class 3

They are dealt with by different teams at the CA Unit - Carer's Credit has less stringent qualifying rules than CA

Jaycee_Dove

Just to update I did fill in the form and send it back as requested some three weeks ago. Still had no response - though was not expecting them to be speedy. At this rate I will have 'retired' by the time I get this sorted. If I do get a resolution in due course then I will let you know.

Jaycee_Dove

A final update. I eventually got a letter confirming that all is resolved - or up to May - at least - when I reach SP age and so stop receiving Carer's Allowance anyhow. If I understood their letter of explanation correctly I did have a 3 year application of a CF 10 from when I started to get CA, but this ran out, nobody told me that it had (as I was never sent a copy) and nobody seemed to know that a new extension was required until about three government departments corresponded with one another.