Income Tax Refund or Off Set - Self Assessment

ArtSeymour

Hello all,

And thanks in advance for any wisdom shared...

I've one sticking point on my self assessment return form;

Q. "Have you had any 2016-17 Income Tax refunded or off-set by us or JobCentre Plus?"
A. Yes or No?

Here's the set up; I am registered as self employed but in the last tax year I ended up working a large chunk of PAYE work too.

For the January payment of income tax (which is an estimated amount based on previous earnings) I contacted HMRC and as I had been paying my tax via PAYE they allowed me to reduce my bill, so that I wasn't in essence paying the tax twice.

So my question is, is what I did related to this question? You could say I off-set the tax I had paid against my bill... But I'm not sure that that's what it's getting at.

Am I making sense?

Here's the question again:
Q. "Have you had any 2016-17 Income Tax refunded or off-set by us or JobCentre Plus?"
A. Yes or No?

And this is the info from the pop out box on the site:

"Income tax refunded
If you've had any Income Tax refunded or off-set by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) or Jobcentre Plus, select 'Yes' otherwise select 'No'.

This could be a repayment of Construction Industry Scheme (CIS) deductions (if you work in the construction industry), PAYE tax (for example, a repayment in respect of a trivial pension commutation claim), or tax paid on savings income. Or it could be an amount HMRC has reallocated to go against an existing debt."

Thanks again.

[Deleted User]

The important words are 'by us' or 'by HM Revenue and Customs'. I would imagine, therfore, that the answer is 'No'.

I am not sure that HMRC would set tax paid against your first payment on account for 2016/17 in January 2017. They may have agreed to reduce your payments on account - not quite the same thing.

Input your profits, employment earnings and tax paid (but not your payments on account) and see what the calculation shows. From that you can deduct the payment on account that you actually made in January to find out what you actually still owe for 2016/17.

ArtSeymour

Many thanks for your reply purdyoaten2. Very much appreciated.

Yes, "reduced payments on account" that's what I was getting at. I had forgotten the proper phrasing!

Good point about the emphasis being on "from us". I think you're right.

I'm thinking though, that as I have made that 'payment on account', that info would be in the HMRC system already, and therefore part of the calculation it makes, without the need for me to re-enter and subtract it. But, let me take a look at what comes up in the calculation and take it from there. :beer:

Dazed_and_confused

This crops up on here regularly each year and payments on account are nothing to do with your self assessment calculation and as such will not be reflected on it and there is nowhere for you to enter them when completing your tax return.

The tax calculation is to show your liability (tax, NIC, student loan etc) for the year and your self assessment statement of account is where your payments on account are taken into account.

For example your calculation for 2016:17 shows £5000 is payable for that year and you have made a payment on account of £1000 in January 2017 towards your 2016:17 liability.

Your tax calculation would show you owe £5000 (for that tax year) but when you send your tax return to HMRC your statement of account will be updated to reflect the £5000 due for 2016:17 and will show any payments on account you have already made so you could say have another £1000 to pay in July 2017 with the balance of £3000 due in January 2018.

Remember payments on account are established by the previous years tax bill so if you reduced them too much the original amount could be reinstated with interest charged for late payment but if your calculation shows an increased amount due when compared to last year any extra due, over and above the payment on account amounts already set, won't need to be paid until January 2018.

ArtSeymour

Many thanks Dazed and Confused, that's a great answer and exactly the info I needed to hear.

Can't thank you enough for taking the time out of your day to write all this to help me out. Great forum here.
:j