Child Tax Credit Overpayment - 6 years old!!!

snit_girl

hi folks, hoping for a bit of help this one. My mum received a letter from HMRC a few weeks ago stating that she had been overpaid child tax credits from Aug 06 - Feb 07. They claim that she informed them my brother left school in Dec 06 instead of Aug 06, apparently she told them this in Feb 07. They're now saying she owes over £700

She phoned them today and is going to ask for a review of this but she needs to be able to prove she did all she could to notify them, considering this is 6 years old getting any relevant paperwork relating to this is going to be very difficult or even impossible.

My mum is very organised, there is no way she took that long to inform them of the change. The only explanation I can think of is that it was a clerical / data error.

Can anyone please advise on how to dispute this? According to HMRC it is her responsibility to prove they're wrong, but I just don't see how this is possible.

She's going to talk to the bank tomorrow to check any payments from back then, hopefully that will be a good enough start

thanks in advance

eadieb

my guess is, that tax credits are trawling through their systems for any anomalies in the run up to universal credits taking its place.

you would normally be entitled to child tax credits for a child, for as long as you receive the child benefit. sometimes there are extensions of child benefit for extra periods beyond a child leaving education - depending on the age of the child. (some people can receive child benefit up to age 19). it might be that your mum got an extension at the time? but this was not communicated to tax credits? its a long shot but i would do what your mum is doing + contact child benefit to find out what their records state. see if you can dig up any extra info.

heather79

request your information from the tax office i think its £10, and they have to print out every screen print they have. i had to do this with regards to my appeal, and it proved they never put through a change after i phoned thus £2500 of debt was wiped off because of there error. your mum can then see when she made the phonecall

zagfles

Was this overpayment not mentioned on every award notice since then?

snit_girl

thanks for the replies.

there have been no award notices since then, he was her youngest and she's sure CTC stopped when he finished school and started uni ... now just to prove it

Dunroamin

Can't she get her bank statements from that period, showing that CTC stopped going into her account in August 06? What about her records for child benefit?

alibeee

I visited my MP with an overpayment issue and he sorted the whole thing out and was on my side. Talking to someone like that face to face really helped. Hope you get it sorted.

zagfles

snit_girl wrote: »

thanks for the replies.

there have been no award notices since then, he was her youngest and she's sure CTC stopped when he finished school and started uni ... now just to prove it

She should have got a finalised 2006/7 award notice - are you sure she didn't? You should ask them for a copy if so.

Did she do her renewal in 2007 - sometime people don't think they need to bother if their claim has ended but you do as it finalises the 2006/7 award, if you don't do it they will finalise based on "the information they have" which might not be correct.