Child Tax Credit New Claim - how long to wait ?

princessdon

When us she 19? What do you plan on doing then?

davefrombristol

She started the course before her 19th birthday ( which will be next January ) so I believe that CTC and CB will be in place until at least next summer when she takes her exams.

System

It's the Child Benefit which is holding everything up. The sooner you get that reinstated the sooner you will get the CTC and HB.
I believe the maximum timescale for reinstating a Child Benefit claim after a gap with no payment for any child at all is 12 weeks.
If she remains in education you can receive payment up to her 20th birthday

davefrombristol

I think your right, I sent in the form weeks ago for CB and even filled in the details online for the college course. I am at present paying for travel every day as its roughly a 10 mile trip to the college ( where I live that is the nearest college btw ). I have also paid £170 so far in costs for her to do the course ( material costs plus the CRO check to confirm that she has no convictions ).

Dunroamin

davefrombristol wrote: »

She started the course before her 19th birthday ( which will be next January ) so I believe that CTC and CB will be in place until at least next summer when she takes her exams.

But how will you manage after that?

davefrombristol

I’ve now been waiting over 5 weeks ( since 3rd Sep ) for child tax credit and child benefit to start paying me.
I tried ringing child benefit and the automated system kindly gave me two option
Press 1 for been waiting for more than 12 weeks … or
Press 2 for waiting less than 12 weeks
I naturally pressed no 2 and an automated message said that they could not assist me as I was under 12 weeks
Today I tried the child tax credit helpline – automated system led me through to choosing to speak to someone with regards to a new claim which is what mine is
Waited for half an hour listening to crappy music and simply gave up waiting …
What the heck am I meant to do ? as I cannot talk to anyone and am stuck on £78 quid a week, and this is meant to keep two adults going week after week and run a home with all the bills !!

davefrombristol

Update:

Another 9 days has passed by and I am still waiting for child tax credit to start paying.

A letter arrived this morning from housing benefit to say that my housing benefit has been suspended from September 29th. They say that my claim will be terminated unless I provide proof of child benefit & child tax credit which is ironic as they have not communicated with me at all.

September 3rd was the date that my daughter started college and I filled in the forms many weeks ago.

Now the next people to contact me will be the housing association as the rent gets paid to them and they will say that I owe rent from the date that housing benefit suspended my claim Sep 29th so that's nearly 3 weeks rent and about £300 debt.

I have done nothing wrong whatsoever and feel like giving up as the system has beaten me. £78 a week for two of us to survive since Sep 3rd has taken its toll and now I feel suicidal as the next stage will be homelessness. My 18 yr old daughter needs a healthy diet as she is type 1 diabetic and the money I get cannot run a home and feed two of us.

I have a deadline to produce award letters of CTC before my HB is terminated - just cannot believe that this is happening

Anatidaephobia

davefrombristol wrote: »

Today I tried the child tax credit helpline – automated system led me through to choosing to speak to someone with regards to a new claim which is what mine is
Waited for half an hour listening to crappy music and simply gave up waiting …
What the heck am I meant to do ? as I cannot talk to anyone and am stuck on £78 quid a week, and this is meant to keep two adults going week after week and run a home with all the bills !!

The best way to find out what is happening with your CTC claim is to phone the tax credits helpline again and wait as long as necessary to get through to a human.

Afternoons (3pm ish) tend to be marginally quieter than other parts of the day; Saturday at 8am is probably the quietest time of the week.

davefrombristol

I've only managed to get through once to them in seven weeks to speak to a human. On that occasion I was told that they would need me to send my daughters birth certificate, I offered to send it to them as I have it here with me, they said no wait for the letter to arrive so it doesn't get lost etc.

I have been a single parent father for nearly 12 years so why they want to delay it on these grounds I don't know. I confirmed with this human that the original application for CTC never asked me to send in the birth certificate.

I cannot waste much needed money ringing 0845 numbers - rather spend it on food !