please help! housing and council tax benefit overpayment

tiphereth

hi. i have just recieved my very confusing housing benefit and council tax benefit notice and i noticed that the child benefit was only for 2 children, despite the fact that i have 3 and it clearly states i have 3 on the form, i remember ringing them when my daughter was born over a year ago to tell them about the increase in child benefit and tax credits and i got a 14 page letter with several award notices stapled together, i couldnt make sense of it so i called them several times and was assured it was being sorted out. our housing benefit amount went down due to the increase in income and we wasnt getting a large amount, around £10 a week possibly less.

we moved house this year and this confused the situation further and it took me ages to get it sorted out as my rent had increased, we were then apparently entitled to more benefits, which to me seemed sensible as the rent was more. so i didnt really read it properly as i find the forms very confusing anyway.

since then my husband has had a slight pay increase so i knew i needed to call them about that and was just getting pay slips together and i noticed on the new award notice it only gives the child benefit amount for 2 children, not for 3 but it says on the form that i have 3 children and my childrens names.

i looked over my old benefit letters and they hadnt increased the amount of child benfit at all despite adding my daughter on and increasing the tax credits amount. i am really worried that im going to have to pay back close to £1000 for over payment for the last year. i just wanted to know where i stand? is this my fault or is it theirs...i clearly told them i had a child as she is on the form, but i obviously didnt check the form properly.

also do they take child benefit into account when working this out? as i just did a housing benefit calculation for what my husband earns now and it asks on the form how many children i recieve child benefit for but then underneath it asks how much we get in other income but clearly states in red letter NOT to include child benefit.

im so confused and worried, i am prepared for losing most of our benefits due to my husbands increase in wage but i am not prepared for having to pay back this if it is indeed classed as an over payment. where do i go from here? please help!

mynameistallulah

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CIS

i looked over my old benefit letters and they hadnt increased the amount of child benfit at all despite adding my daughter on and increasing the tax credits amount

Child Benefit hasn't been taken in to account as income since Oct 2009 so it in itself wont have caused an overpayment.

It sounds more likely it was your tax credits that have not been declared correctly - councils are now getting automated tax credit change notifications from HMRC and a staggering number of them have changes which haven't been correctly notified to the councils and therefore cause overpayments.

You need to speak with the council and check that the 3rd child has been noted on your HB/CTB claim correctly as it can make a big difference.

daimonde

CIS wrote: »

councils are now getting automated tax credit change notifications from HMRC and a staggering number of them have changes which haven't been correctly notified to the councils and therefore cause overpayments.

processing these supposedly 'automated' changes takes a huge part of our time these days, im sure we must have it set up incorrectly
but yeh, a large amount of overpayments are caused due to this.

CIS

processing these supposedly 'automated' changes takes a huge part of our time these days, im sure we must have it set up incorrectly
but yeh, a large amount of overpayments are caused due to this.

Luckily I'm not dealing with change in claims (just the fall out) but the same happens in my authority with it 'not being set up correctly'...