A new chapter, An empty nest, Drama school & Last year of Uni

badmemory

The problem with HMRC is that they are getting busier every year.  Just think that they have 800,000 extra simple assessment alone to do this year & then there are all those earning more who now have to do self assessment.  None of which makes it any easier for the rest of us to deal with.  Last year my simple assessment was 6 months late & would have been even later if I hadn't got worried that it had got lost in the post & got stroppy.  If you want to talk 8am is best.

Spendless

Friday again and moved £5 into savings pots. There is now £14 in both 'lost' and 'stolen' and £15 in jabberwocky. Next week will enable me to even these 3 pots out again.

DH rang HMRC. Thanks for the tip about ringing early. There seems to be 2 different issues going on. One is a tax code that has been incorrect for the past few years (relating to higher child benefit tax). The other Mr S has been told he has  to do a self assessment as his benefits in kind come to more than £2k. This makes no sense to me his bik have topped £2k for many years, hes PAYE. He did SA when I still received CB but kids are in their 20s now and he has an HMRC  letter  saying he no longer needs to do them dated a few years ago. He also says once he does this SA he wont need to do another?? Its as clear as mud! 

Its been a lot cooler this week. Last Friday it was too hot to think straight.

Now we have DD's timetable we are making plans to visit, aiming to be there for DH's 60th bday. 

We have also bought a roll end for our living room, which does need a refurb but this is just a 'put on for now' as a freshen up till we get the finances together for more major renovation. By the time we'd added on underlay and new grippers it was close to £400. Not exactly cheap as chips  for what is a small room but when the dog comes home from the groomers hates his 'newly shampooed' smell on him and rolls around the carpet because it has a more pleasing dog ordour then you know its time to replace. 
 

badmemory

HMRC are a mess at present so before DH decides not to file make sure he has something in writing in his grubby little hand that says you do not need to file self assessment.

If my guestimate is correct HMRC are dealing with at least half a million people more that are not just the normal PAYE than a couple of years ago plus seconding quite a few to the DWP with no actual extra staff.

cbsexec

Totally agree about Hmrc.  Not enough knowledgeable staff to cope with demand 

in_need_of_direction

Only way I got a response from hmrc was via my mp.

Spendless

Thanks for responses. Wonder whats the reason for  HMRC  have an increased workload? 

We'll see what the end of the month's payslip says. DH says his tax code changed very quickly after speaking to the lady about the child benefit charge being on it, but that wont account for the past few years when its been on there and shouldn't have been. That might need another phone call.

Having to do a SA seems to be seperate issue even though Im none the wiser why he needs to. Think best do it and then find out more.

Yesterday we went through the credit cards to pay off from the expenses ran up last month mostly of an  educational/health/household goods nature.  Gosh that was time consuming. They dont need to be paid until 1st September but so glad that we did it this BH weekend. Trying to get Mr S to understand the question 'what did we use to pay this? ' doesnt mean the answer is 'the credit card' yes I know that! Where did we pull the money from to pay the credit card?. This was because he was insisting that 1 months student rental had already been paid (yes, on the CC. We still needed to pay the CC off and take that money from somewhere!). Honestly felt like I needed a masters in managing financials and spouses! We got there in the end. 

Theres not much money left in the account for the rest of the week till payday (thankfully early due to way month falls) and Ive no wish to go into our overdraft having stayed out of it for so long. Its been a month heavy on expenditure.  I've made a meal plan and shopping list that will get us through to Thursday night. I have burgers, chicken and mince in as well as rice, naan and garlic bread, some oven chips and a small amount of salad. That will give us evening meals of chilli, curry, burgers and chips. Lunches will be sandwiches/salads/jackets and bfast,  toast, bacon sandwiches or porridge. I usually also eat at my parents once a week whilst DH works away. 

We have booked for the 3 of us to go and see daughter now living in the States. We will be there for DH's 60th. I am so excited to be doing this. It was my dream to go as a family in Spring 2021 to celebrate kids 21st and 18th birthdays that fell in the same month, but the pandemic was still ongoing, we were still in lockdown3 and then 'life' just got in the way.  This will be paid for out of savings and repaid over time - maybe there's good news to come from HMRC. 

badmemory

Just in case you actually meant your question about HMRC!

The personal allowance was frozen several years ago by the last government & continued by the current one, so the situation has been getting worse with every year.  It means that all those pensioners that just have a little extra are now becoming tax payers but very often cannot have the tax deducted via any form of PAYE.  I am one of this group, as PAYE is not allowed to take more than 50% of that income.  This is normally done by simple (not self) assessment.  Mine had been arriving in July payable at the same time as self assessment so January.  Lat year it arrived in January because I spoke to them (it took 3 calls to get through) as I was worried it had got lost in the post.  So wasn't payable until April.

Then you have people whose pay means they pay 40% tax many/most of whom have to file self assessment.

I also believe that many were seconded to the DWP to deal with their many issues especially with the NI/state pension additions that finally ended in April.

Spendless

Thanks @badmemory - Yes, I really was interested in knowing so cheers for reply. Mr S says he's going to ring HMRC again and query it all, I've asked him to put off ringing until the end of the week when his pay slip is showing and he can see what he has/hasn't paid and what his tax code now is. Watch this space......

Bank hol update briefing - After Saturday spent sorting out house and finances, Sunday was spent me, DH and another relative going for an afternoon drinking session. We had beer, cider, cocktails and a snack tray of food nibbles. Back at home the menfolk had a bonfire whilst I snoozed off the drink -lol and then we made our way through the burgers we had in instead of ordering a drink fuelled take away. 

BH Monday - I went with my parents to watch the cinema showing of Six the musical which we all enjoyed very much.

I was making the most of this long BH weekend off as it's probably the last I get in a while, because I have started a new job, but in retail rather than the office type work I usually do. This is because things came to a head over the last fortnight. I saw the organisation that help you find work and they explained more about how the structure of a job application should be. DD then paused her packing to help as what I'd been told followed how she has to present essays at Uni. It took her 1.5 hours and some of it had been already filled in, she was rearanging and reqording some of it!. I got an interview. The night before I prepped my likely questions and answers again in the format I'd been told to do. At this point Mr S said to me 'you are having to go to this length for a job of that calbre' (lowest grade, slightly above min wage). I replied yes, I'd been telling him this for months what it was like for me, how stressful and mostly never even hearing back this was only the 2nd interview I'd got since April, on top of what the jobs were like once you actually landed one.  I went to the interview, the questions were different and you wrote them down in advance but I came out with the feeling I'd not quite hit the mark. Mr S was even more incredulous at the hoops I was jumping through for what was a 'basic job' . I then applied for another job within the same organisation using the same format as previously. This one I've not even been successful in securing an interview. Meanwhile during youngest's last few days here whilst we'd been popping into town for various bits, I'd seen an ad for a vacancy in a ladies clothing store. It wasn't advertised online. It asked you to go into store with your CV, so I changed mine around to include the bit of retail work I've done previously and made more of a thing about transferrable skills and took it in. I was later contacted about an interview, and at the end of tthat offerred the job which I have now started. It is temporary and part time, the contract less than 1/3 of what I was working f-time, but I've said I'm open to overtime. 1 additional shift a week will mean me being able to pay student rent in full. 2 or 3 additional shifts would be more beneficial to me long term. I've resisted going down this route before due to the weekend/BH working when DH is off, but I needed to look for something else to do. We have discussed changing our mindset to doing quality stuff outside my working hours  . On my way to my first shift at the clothes shop I received a call from the place I'd had my interview at, I hadn't been successful. My answers had been fine but because so many got the same score they had to go with the person who knew their systems (which must have been an internal candidate). I think  I made the right call. The sheer relief of doing a 4 hour shift rather than 5 consecutive full time days has been immense. 

In other news Mr S booked the accommodation for when we travel to see youngest now studying abroad. That included 1 night in England  near the airport before the flight. Normally he uses his hotel lopyalty points for this but he didn't have enough and wasn't sure he'd accumnmulate enough before we go, so he paid with a mix of points and cash believeing he only paid when we got there. He was wrong. Doing it this way meant paying immediately, something not taken into account and our bank acc is very low. It will only go into the overdraft tomorrow night and then he gets paid Fri so think I'll just borrow from savings for 1 day and pay it straight back. He'd have never used his low loyalty point in this way if he'd realised that the money would come straight out as we'd budgeted for everything until payday. We will manage. I did a grocery shop, we have food in and we just have to accept that this month just 'caught' up'  with us. 

badmemory

Suggest that your DH rings HMRC at 8am.  That is considered the best time to try.  There is the added advantage that sometimes that early on you don't always get the phone monkeys.

cbsexec

Congratulations on the job.   I know how stressful job hunting is at the moment