Hmr say i owe over £300

Marie_Williams

I retired in August 2012. I was 73 when I finished. I paid tax via PAYE on my salary and on another small pension from a previous employer. This ran normally for over 20 years. This April I received a letter from HMR saying I owed over £300 and they would start taking it from next April. I am now on a limited income and this will be difficult.

HMR had all the information re my employer and pension provider so why do I owe them and can I complain as they had all the information required to deduct the correct amounts?

CLAPTON

if you are saying that your tax for the year 2012-13 was incorrect and HMRC are recovering the shortfall then no, you you will have to pay it.


However are you sure it's due?

If you want to post up the details we could perhaps check them for you

Laurajo_2

I wonder if too little tax was collected through your PAYE earnings?

If you are in receipt of state pension, tax on this is usually collected through your 'main' PAYE source - which, presumably would be your employment. As this stopped in August, hmrc may not have realised you had retired (they really aren't very joined up) or your employer pension may have been too low to collect the tax due on the state pension.

What tax codes did you have for your employment and your pension?

Also, hmrc aren't altogether fantastic at collating information and they view it as the taxpayers responsibility to check PAYE codes and ensure they are paying the correct amount of tax....therefore, just because they haven't issued the right code doesn't mean you aren't liable for the tax.

It's always worth a letter to appeal against this and explain what's happened - if you are sure they had the correct information, you could try appealing under esc a19 - which means that you may not have to pay where hmrc have not used information.


If you do have to pay it might be easier to take it as an adjustment to next years PAYE code for your pension if possible, as then it will be collect over twelve months rather than payable in full.

antrobus

Laurajo wrote: »

... As this stopped in August, hmrc may not have realised you had retired (they really aren't very joined up) ....

How would HMRC have "realised" that a 73 year-old had in fact finally decided to retire unless they were told. They might well not be very joined up, but they are certainly not telepathic.:)

Laurajo_2

Well, they may not have realised he'd retired, but presumably there would be a p45 sent in, which would make them aware the employment had ceased....usually, I would hope the pension PAYE code which had been secondary would be reissued to take into account the fact that this is now the OPs sole source of PAYE income...

Although could be a moot point as we don't know what codes OP is/was on.