High Income Child Benefit Charge

badmemory

The biggest problem with all this is that our tax system is not even remotely logical. The person receiving the child benefit is often not the person who needs to pay it back. Is there an annual letter stating the amount of child benefit that includes a note, preferably in bold, about the need to "repay" if earnings are over a certain amount? I've never heard one being mentioned. If you receive a state pension you get a leaflet every year which tells you what & when you need to contact them.

There is the similar situation that if you earn enough you are no longer a person, well you are no longer entitled to a personal allowance, how illogical is that.

beefturnmail

badmemory wrote: »

The biggest problem with all this is that our tax system is not even remotely logical.

Quite - and the public are expected to keep up with this complex, illogical and everchanging systems and do all the legwork, admin and chasing, effectively as unpaid Government employees.

dori2o

beefturnmail wrote: »

Quite - and the public are expected to keep up with this complex, illogical and everchanging systems and do all the legwork, admin and chasing, effectively as unpaid Government employees.

But that has always been the case.

That is the exact point that I and others have been making.

You, I, and everyone else in the country are responsible for our own tax affairs. Responsible for informing HMRC where necessary to ensure you are paying the right amount.

It has never been the opposite way around in modern times.

HMRC are not, and never have been responsible for the upkeep of your information.

The problem is that for too long HMRC have been doing more than they should have been doing. Partly down to PAYE where people have been allowed to assume that Tax is none of their business 'because my employer deals with that'.

This has come as a shock to many people, but the information has been readily available the whole time. But this should now start the change that is needed and force people to start managing their own affairs properly, as they should always have been doing.

This is now simpler to do with the introduction of the online Personal Tax Account.

badmemory

As I have said before HMRC no longer recognise/acknowledge their charter which is to HELP people pay the correct tax. It is now to fine/charge penalties as much as possible because they are failing to get the tax evaders to pay up & they have to get the money from somewhere. We are their sitting targets.

The ordinary people who think they have always fulfilled their responsibilities & are being caught out by new ever increasingly complex rules, that without any input from HMRC we are supposed to just know or be fined, charged penalties etc. Often many years down the line. Basically tough luck if you don't have online access to anything, definitely your problem not theirs as I doubt they can even be bothered writing you a letter about it - after all you should know anyway. Probably by osmosis, as any info in the news/papers is seriously questionable.

shaka1510

dori2o wrote: »

But that has always been the case.

That is the exact point that I and others have been making.

You, I, and everyone else in the country are responsible for our own tax affairs. Responsible for informing HMRC where necessary to ensure you are paying the right amount.

It has never been the opposite way around in modern times.

HMRC are not, and never have been responsible for the upkeep of your information.

The problem is that for too long HMRC have been doing more than they should have been doing. Partly down to PAYE where people have been allowed to assume that Tax is none of their business 'because my employer deals with that'.

This has come as a shock to many people, but the information has been readily available the whole time. But this should now start the change that is needed and force people to start managing their own affairs properly, as they should always have been doing.

This is now simpler to do with the introduction of the online Personal Tax Account.

I am sure everyone understands that we are all responsible for our own tax affairs, however, as most PAYE employees, I was totally unaware that I needed to fill in a self-assessment tax return as my earnings have reached a certain level. Having contacted HMRC to discuss the original letter that I received from them regarding 2015 and 2016, I now have a letter from them saying they have now set up a self assessment record and sent me a tax return to complete for 2017.

Surely they would know from my earnings that I would have needed to have completed a self assessment tax return 3 years ago? I know people will start and go on about the media campaign back in 2013, however, I do not have any recollection of it whatsoever, probably because (like many others) I was below the threshold at the time.

My wife had a letter from HMRC back in May 2017 "About your Child Benefit" which included a little booklet that contained a lot of "You must tell us straightaway" scenarios - although no mention of if your earnings creep above a certain level!

As noted in my previous post, I am not disputing the fact that I need to pay this money back particularly, however, the various fines and interest charges are totally unjust in my opinion.

xylophone

My wife had a letter from HMRC back in May 2017 "About your Child Benefit" which included a little booklet that contained a lot of "You must tell us straightaway" scenarios - although no mention of if your earnings creep above a certain level!

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/646607/CH1715_10_17.pdf

This section was not in May version?

Important information
If you or your partner have an individual income

of more than £50,000 a year.

If either you or your partner have an individual income of more than
£50,000 a year, then the partner with the higher income has to pay
Income Tax on some, or all of the Child Benefit you receive (or that
someone else receives for a child who lives with you). The tax is known
as High Income Child Benefit Charge;.
For more information, go to https://www.gov.uk/child!benefit tax charge.
If this applies to you or your partner, you should still claim Child Benefit
for your child, as it can help to protect your State Pension and will make
sure your child receives a National Insurance number. You do have a
choice about whether or not you receive the payments.

You can jointly decide either to:
get Child Benefit payments and declare them for tax purposes
not get Child Benefit payments and not have to pay a tax charge

beefturnmail

So what it comes down to is should the state serve the people or the people serve the state? I would suggest the former, but in this case, it is the latter.

inapina

My base salary was below the 50k threshold, but I worked a load of overtime (busy period!), and earned about another 8k gross, which put me into the >50k bracket in 2014-15. The whole child allowance thing never entered my head, and, like others have said, nothing has ever come from HMRC to prompt me into thinking about being in a higher bracket, even though they must know. What really annoys me is that, as a 40% taxpayer, the Govt got a full 40% of the extra 8K, so an extra 3.2k that they would not have had ordinarily, from MY hard work, and now they want a further 1.5k in backdated child benefits repaid, plus a fine, on top of all this. It's no wonder people are angry. Earning over 50k isn't even enough to get a mortgage on a cheap house where I live and my wife earns next to nothing, so I support us both. I also adopted my 2 children, saving the Govt the cost of raising them in care for 16 years, which would have cost them a couple of million all told. I'm just so angry at the greed and ignorance of HMRC, and the lack of joined-up thinking in implementing the tax system. Why not reduce or stop paying the Child Support at the time? And as the CB goes to my wife, I can't even talk to them about it, even though we're still married and they;re coming after ME for the money! Angry about all this!!

John-K_3

inapina wrote: »

My base salary was below the 50k threshold, but I worked a load of overtime (busy period!), and earned about another 8k gross, which put me into the >50k bracket in 2014-15. The whole child allowance thing never entered my head, and, like others have said, nothing has ever come from HMRC to prompt me into thinking about being in a higher bracket, even though they must know. What really annoys me is that, as a 40% taxpayer, the Govt got a full 40% of the extra 8K, so an extra 3.2k that they would not have had ordinarily, from MY hard work, and now they want a further 1.5k in backdated child benefits repaid, plus a fine, on top of all this. It's no wonder people are angry. Earning over 50k isn't even enough to get a mortgage on a cheap house where I live and my wife earns next to nothing, so I support us both. I also adopted my 2 children, saving the Govt the cost of raising them in care for 16 years, which would have cost them a couple of million all told. I'm just so angry at the greed and ignorance of HMRC, and the lack of joined-up thinking in implementing the tax system. Why not reduce or stop paying the Child Support at the time? And as the CB goes to my wife, I can't even talk to them about it, even though we're still married and they;re coming after ME for the money! Angry about all this!!

It’s understandable you being angry at yourself, but it will not help. Just make sure not to neglect being on top of your finances in future.

In terms of what you pay, look on the bright side. If you were me or me wife you would be paying 47% on most of your wages, would have no personal allowance, and would only be allowed to put £10,000 per year into your pension. You are only being asked to pay a few tens of thousands in tax, we have to pay far more.

xylophone

You are only being asked to pay a few tens of thousands in tax, we have to pay far more.

I'm sure that all those benefiting from your largesse are very grateful!:)