Child Benefit - Major Problem

Cate1976

My Child benefit didn't go into my bank account on Monday so I phoned the number on the letter with my Child Benefit number on it. My husband was talking to them after I'd given them permission to speak to him. We were both horrified when we were told that payments have been stopped due to the claim being under investigation. My husband was asked the following questions:

1) Have you been abroad for more than 8 weeks? answer is no we haven't. I did say that surely moving from Northern Ireland to England isn't that unusual and person said it isn't

2) Are we still together? Yes.

3) Have our children always been living with us? Yes.

We said that we need the money to pay rent (needed for October's due to only getting 3 weeks worth for first payment) so person said that they'd send payment request to Child Benefit office.

Monday afternoon, I phoned them to ask what was happening to be told that form is being sent out for us to get the number changed from a Northern Ireland to an English number but moving shouldn't have caused payments to be stopped.

I phoned Child Benefit back in mid August to get my number sent out as JSA needed it, I mentioned about moving and was told to let them know after we'd moved and there wouldn't be a problem.

A couple of weeks ago, I phoned Child tax Credits to give them our new address and they said they'd let child benefit know. I was pleased as it meant one less phone call for me to do.

I'd be really grateful if someone who knows anything about how Child Benefit works could tell me what reasons there could be for the move causing our payments to be stopped. When I get the forms to get an English number, I will be adding in a complaint that I wasn't told back in August that moving could cause problems.

xylophone

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/childbenefit/payments-entitlements/payments/no-payment.htm

You've seen this?

Cate1976

Thanks for posting, I saw it yesterday after first phone call. When asked for our address, I gave them our new one which is the one they have. Bank details haven't changed, it wasn't internet banking being behind as it was 11am that I checked bank account. If the money was in, it would have been listed, I also checked pending transactions. Once I have the payment owed, I will be changing the bank account it goes into.

If there is a genuine issue and the questions asked in first call have made me think there is why didn't they send me a letter saying what the problem and what I have to do for payments to be reinstated.

warmhands.coldheart

Cate1976 wrote: »

..............
1) Have you been abroad for more than 8 weeks? answer is no we haven't. I did say that surely moving from Northern Ireland to England isn't that unusual and person said it isn't.

Last time I looked Northern Ireland was still park of the UK..... Has somehting changed in the last week??

Cate1976

Benefits in Northern Ireland are seperate from mainland Britain. Some benefits can be transferred from one to the other. JSA is one that isn't, DLA, Carer's Allowance & IS would have been if we had been on those. CTC wasn't a problem and CB shouldn't have been either.

Phoned CB again this morning and all that's showing is that claim is in processing centre. What should have happened is a maintain payment marker to be put on our claim to ensure we still got paid while waiting for English number to be issued. In terms of timescale if there is an issue, the processing centre should contact me within 5 working days of 1st October. If there aren't any issues, payment should be within 7 working days of 1st October, whether that's issued or in my account I'm not sure, hoping it's the latter.

Cate1976

Phoned again yesterday morning and was told that a payment has been issued which will be in my bank a/c on Tuesday. I'm assuming that the maintain payment marker wasn't applied. So relieved that I don't have to get evidence to prove I'm entitled to it.