HMRC: Claim Personal Pension Tax Relief (beta)

Sarahspangles

I’ve just used the new service to submit a request for a refund of higher rate tax paid this tax year (2024/25). The reply timescale quoted is 28 working days.

There is one place where I think they need to provide a bit more guidance. You can submit information about more than one pension e.g. SIPP plus workplace pension. After filling in my SIPP information, I started to complete the same section for my workplace pension, but as this is net pay the calculation that HMRC then generated for relief at source was incorrect, and couldn’t be edited. So I removed those entries completely. I think that was right - and it doesn’t make a difference in my case whether or not they take this pension into account - but it’s counter intuitive, since that PAYE employment is where the higher rate tax is deducted. I’ll feed back.

I wonder if they will accept the evidence I uploaded. I used AJ Bell web chat a few days ago, they said HMRC should accept a pdf of the cash statement. It’s not as easy for HMRC to use as the Annual Statement, as they have to pick through looking for debit card and faster payment deposits. The annual statement won’t be generated for another five months.

molerat

Why did you even consider telling them about a net pay pension ?  With net pay any tax is already accounted for and telling them about it would make them try to effectively give double tax relief.  They are only interested in RAS gross pension contributions.

Sarahspangles

molerat said:

Why did you even consider telling them about a net pay pension ?  Any tax is already accounted for and telling them about it would make them try to effectively give double tax relief.  They are only interested in RAS gross pension contributions.

Yes, I knew that. But when you get to that screen the question asked is ‘Do you have other pensions’. It needs clarification at that point that HMRC are only interested in a further relief at source pension. We all know that Sal sac, net pay and relief at source confuse the layman.

I think some people will complete it for other types of pension, get to the screen which calculates relief (as if it’s relief at source) and think ‘Oh great, they owe me more’.

You might know this one - one of the questions is ‘Have you made a lump sum contribution’. There’s no definition of lump sum, and why would it make a difference if you’ve made lumpy payments as opposed to high but regular contributions?

Dazed_and_C0nfused

molerat said:

Why did you even consider telling them about a net pay pension ?  With net pay any tax is already accounted for and telling them about it would make them try to effectively give double tax relief.  They are only interested in RAS gross pension contributions.

I've had a look and agree with @Sarahspangles

Me you and Sarah know it is for relief at source contributions.  But I don't think it actually says that.  There are references to workplace schemes but they can be any of net pay, relief at source and salary sacrifice.

Pension terminology easily confuses people, especially those navigating stuff like this for the first time and maybe referring to contributions where basic rate relief has been added to the pension fund would help people?

Dazed_and_C0nfused

Take this part of the gov.uk page.  To me the bit highlighted in bold would mean you needed to write in if you were a basic rate payer and made contributions to a personal pension that operate the relief at source method. 

I would expect all personal pensions to be operating relief at source, not net pay.  But why would you want to involve HMRC if you have made a RAS contribution as a basic rate payer?


You will need to call or write to us to claim tax relief if you are paying the basic rate of tax and:

your pension scheme is not set up for automatic tax relief

you pay a lump sum into a personal pension that is not under a net pay scheme

Sarahspangles

Dazed_and_C0nfused said:

molerat said:

Why did you even consider telling them about a net pay pension ?  With net pay any tax is already accounted for and telling them about it would make them try to effectively give double tax relief.  They are only interested in RAS gross pension contributions.

I've had a look and agree with @Sarahspangles

Me you and Sarah know it is for relief at source contributions.  But I don't think it actually says that.  There are references to workplace schemes but they can be any of net pay, relief at source and salary sacrifice.

Pension terminology easily confuses people, especially those navigating stuff like this for the first time and maybe referring to contributions where basic rate relief has been added to the pension fund would help people?

I’ve fed back to HMRC on these lines. They’ve improved the Pension forecast screens over the last few months, hopefully they’ll improve this process too.

By the way, someone previously mentioned that there is information online that you have to submit a Self Assessment return to recover higher rate tax. I think it’s at this screen https://www.gov.uk/tax-on-your-private-pension/pension-tax-relief. If you don’t immediately follow the link under ‘Claiming tax relief yourself’ it’s easy to assume the next section about self assessment is what applies to you. Finally, you have to go a long way down the page to find the instruction to call them for sums less than £10k.

Right that’s enough beta testing now Sarah….

Sarahspangles

The outcome of my submission is that my tax code changed today. I haven’t received the usual email notifying this - possibly tomorrow?

This has taken 33 working days rather than the 28 stated as the expected reply timescale, but considering it’s a new process I’m pleasantly surprised.

This change was always going to be too late to be available for the March payroll run, so I presumably now wait for a P800 and invitation to request refund. But people using it earlier in the year in 2025/26 should get their refund in-year.

I’m also seeing some new layouts of information about tax codes in the HMRC app. These compare current and next year side by side. I think this is clearer.