No tax credits for years due to wrong info given on renewal phone call

Nazeboy

Can't find anyone with a similar problem on here. In 2008 I phoned to renew my tax credits and when I told them I earned 14,000 in the previous year I was told I was no longer entitled to tax credits and therefore didn't bother to claim for the next six years. After talking to a few people recently I have learned this wasn't the case and I can only assume that the operator misheard my income declaration as £40,000 !

I am in a very bad way financialy and to say that the last six years have been a struggle is somewhat of an understatement. I have missed out on thousands of pounds that I was entitled to. Is there anyway of claiming these payments back for the years I have missed out on?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Caz3121

was this child or working tax credits. The cutoff for a single person with no children is around £13k
How many children are you claiming for?

Nazeboy

It was three at the time, now two as one is now over 18 and out of full time education.

Nazeboy

I don't recall receiving one, but I have all the correspondence stored, I will have a look through it tonight.

Icequeen99

Nazeboy wrote: »

Can't find anyone with a similar problem on here. In 2008 I phoned to renew my tax credits and when I told them I earned 14,000 in the previous year I was told I was no longer entitled to tax credits and therefore didn't bother to claim for the next six years. After talking to a few people recently I have learned this wasn't the case and I can only assume that the operator misheard my income declaration as £40,000 !

I am in a very bad way financialy and to say that the last six years have been a struggle is somewhat of an understatement. I have missed out on thousands of pounds that I was entitled to. Is there anyway of claiming these payments back for the years I have missed out on?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

It would very surprising if this could happen. If they did hear £40,000, you would have then received an award notice showing that income figure and you would have had an overpayment.

Whatever figure you gave, if you renewed over the phone that would have finalised your income for the year just ended and it would be a claim for the 08/09 tax year from April 2008. They would have sent you an award notice showing this and the details used.

I suggest you look through your paperwork and see what the last piece of correspondence you have says.

If you didn't renew, you would have received a statement of account and they would have asked for payments from April 08 to when they terminated your payments back.

I think something else must have happened here. Did you report any other changes of circumstances at that time that might have stopped your award?

IQ