Tax rebate

sneezyboots

Hi

I didn't really know where to put this so apologies if it is the wrong place.

Hoping you wonderful people can clear something up for me.

I am a teacher of 5 years and was paying the General Teaching Council fee until it stopped recently. I have also been paying NUT subscriptions since I started teaching. I recently found out that I could claim tax back on these so sent HMRC a letter with copies of my subscriptions and and tax related paperwork I have been sent over the last 5 years. The amount in subscriptions came to just over £500 and I asked for a recalculation of my tax and to be paid anything owed.

Today I receive a letter from them saying yes I have overpaid and documents detailing how. A separate letter came containing my rebate cheque- for £3400 :eek:

Now I'm assuming they know what the are doing and have done this calculation correctly but is there any chance they are going to write to me again saying they got it wrong before I get all excited? I don't really understand the paperwork they sent with how they calculated the refund but don't see how it could have been so out.

Plus- on this basis (that tax can often be out by quite a bit without us knowing) is it worth my husband (not a teacher) writing to check his tax has been correct the last few years as his pay does alter slightly from month to month just to be sure he hasn't overpaid??

Thanks for any help you can provide.

nomunnofun

I think that we need more details about the enclosures. Can you check, for example, that the gross pay is correctly shown for each year?

I had a director client last month who received practically all of his tax back for 2012/13 - £30000 or so. HMRC had managed to reduce his salary from £104000 to £10400.

sneezyboots

Ekk that sounds scary.

I've just had a look at the figures and they do seem to add up. It is a rebate for the last 3 years of just over £1000 a year.

I think I have my head around it but would be grateful if you could clarify.

The first one for example says income = £22414, tax paid £4389 which by my calculation is too much in the first place- correct??
Then they have taken off my subscriptions that year of a whole £34! to reduce income to £22380, then taken off the personal allowance that year of £6475 and calculated tax at 20% and worked out tax should have been £3181.

I have a tax calculation sheet detailing this to be the case for 10-11, 11-12 and 12-13 (just different amounts each year).

On that basis the rebate is correct?? If so- is this HMRC putting me on the wrong tax code the whole time or the school or what? Surely after the first year being wrong it should have corrected itself for the years after?

To throw another spanner in the works- for all 3 years this rebate has been calculated for I wasn't in the pension scheme. I know that meant more tax/NI etc but that wouldn't change what these figures are would it? Just make it more favourable for me now I am?

Savvy_Sue

sneezyboots wrote: »

A separate letter came containing my rebate cheque- for £3400 :eek:

Now I'm assuming they know what the are doing and have done this calculation correctly

Dangerous assumptions. They may well have done the calculation correctly, but based it on completely incorrect information.

You and your DH could do worse than put figures from previous P60s into one of the tax calculators, eg Listen to Taxman.

zygurat789

sneezyboots wrote: »

Hi

I didn't really know where to put this so apologies if it is the wrong place.

Hoping you wonderful people can clear something up for me.

I am a teacher of 5 years and was paying the General Teaching Council fee until it stopped recently. I have also been paying NUT subscriptions since I started teaching. I recently found out that I could claim tax back on these so sent HMRC a letter with copies of my subscriptions and and tax related paperwork I have been sent over the last 5 years. The amount in subscriptions came to just over £500 and I asked for a recalculation of my tax and to be paid anything owed.

Today I receive a letter from them saying yes I have overpaid and documents detailing how. A separate letter came containing my rebate cheque- for £3400 :eek:

Now I'm assuming they know what the are doing and have done this calculation correctly but is there any chance they are going to write to me again saying they got it wrong before I get all excited? I don't really understand the paperwork they sent with how they calculated the refund but don't see how it could have been so out.

Plus- on this basis (that tax can often be out by quite a bit without us knowing) is it worth my husband (not a teacher) writing to check his tax has been correct the last few years as his pay does alter slightly from month to month just to be sure he hasn't overpaid??

Thanks for any help you can provide.

You claimed £500 of expenses, the tax rate is 20% and you received a refund of £3,400 and you are wondering if it might be wrong. You didn't say what you taught, I don't think it was maths, was it? To get a rebate of £3,400 at 20% you would need to have allowances of £12,000 over 5 years.

Presumably the documents detailing how you have overpaid are P800s
and you can now see what would appear to be a fairly large discrepancy. Check the figures yourself as far as you can and then post the figures.
We should be able to help.

nomunnofun

What tax code were you on each year? Had you any benefits in kind from your employer - company car, healthcare etc? Or from a former employer which carried on?

nomunnofun

zygurat789 wrote: »

You claimed £500 of expenses, the tax rate is 20% and you received a refund of £3,400 and you are wondering if it might be wrong. You didn't say what you taught, I don't think it was maths, was it? To get a rebate of £3,400 at 20% you would need to have allowances of £12,000 over 5 years.

Presumably the documents detailing how you have overpaid are P800s
and you can now see what would appear to be a fairly large discrepancy. Check the figures yourself as far as you can and then post the figures.
We should be able to help.

Whoops! You do mean £17000?

zygurat789

sneezyboots wrote: »

Ekk that sounds scary.

I've just had a look at the figures and they do seem to add up. It is a rebate for the last 3 years of just over £1000 a year.

I think I have my head around it but would be grateful if you could clarify.

The first one for example says income = £22414, tax paid £4389 which by my calculation is too much in the first place- correct??
Then they have taken off my subscriptions that year of a whole £34! to reduce income to £22380, then taken off the personal allowance that year of £6475 and calculated tax at 20% and worked out tax should have been £3181.

I have a tax calculation sheet detailing this to be the case for 10-11, 11-12 and 12-13 (just different amounts each year).

On that basis the rebate is correct?? If so- is this HMRC putting me on the wrong tax code the whole time or the school or what? Surely after the first year being wrong it should have corrected itself for the years after?

To throw another spanner in the works- for all 3 years this rebate has been calculated for I wasn't in the pension scheme. I know that meant more tax/NI etc but that wouldn't change what these figures are would it? Just make it more favourable for me now I am?

It may well be too much but is it what you paid?
Do you have P60s for these years. If not you should have and in future you should keep them.
The 4389 tax is on £21,945 and yor salary was £22,414 so the personal allowance does not appear to be there.
Have you ever had two jobs? Did you have a PT jkob before you started teaching?

zygurat789

nomunnofun wrote: »

Whoops! You do mean £17000?

Of course. Bad light on the calculator and my cataracts.

nomunnofun

zygurat789 wrote: »

It may well be too much but is it what you paid?
Do you have P60s for these years. If not you should have and in future you should keep them.
The 4389 tax is on £21,945 and yor salary was £22,414 so the personal allowance does not appear to be there.
Have you ever had two jobs? Did you have a PT jkob before you started teaching?

Yes - we need the tax codes from the op - 46L would appear to have been operated in the year quoted from my calculations

sneezyboots

I've checked all figure against p60s and all are correct if I have been checking it right. Salary minus allowance then 20% tax and checked the figures against what I actually paid (according to p60s) and all are overpaid by the amount the rebate calculates.

In answer to some of your questions- never had a company car or any other type of benefit. And yes leading up to teaching I worked loads of student jobs for 5 years (more than one at a time often) and just use to write asking for them to check my tax at the end of the year (usually resulting in small rebates), but I assumed when I started teaching as that was my only job and was a proper salary it would all be straightforward.