How do they know

Mariolanza

It may have been asked before but I cannot find it.

The Winter fuel payment has been reinstated to those pensioners whose income is below £35000 per annum.

My question is How do the government know your income? Do they have access to your bank account?

Stubod

..the same way they know what tax code to give you.....

SVaz

They know because pension companies report to hmrc in the same way that banks and building societies report savings interest. 

If you have a pension, you have a tax code pertaining to that pension. 

squirrelpie

And if you have any income that isn't automatically recorded like that, then you have to [should be] completing a tax return to tell HMRC. Not doing so is an offence AFAIK.

p00hsticks

As DWP don't deal with tax issues, my understanding is that they'll be paying it out to anyone who hasn't proactively opted out, and HMRC will then claw it back via the tax code from those who turn out not to have met the eligibility criteria. 

Dazed_and_C0nfused

Mariolanza said:

It may have been asked before but I cannot find it.

The Winter fuel payment has been reinstated to those pensioners whose income is below £35000 per annum.

My question is How do the government know your income? Do they have access to your bank account?

Not sure where you have read that but it's wrong.

The winter fuel payment has been reinstated to everyone.  You could have opted out of receiving it but that window closed a couple of weeks ago.

DWP will make the payments and HMRC will sort out getting it back from those people whose income is more than £35,000.  HMRC gets lots of info about taxable income from employers, pension payers, DWP and banks and building societies.

And if you need to complete a tax return for some reason then it will be collected back via your Self Assessment calculation (if your income is more than £35,000).

SarahB16

Mariolanza said:

It may have been asked before but I cannot find it.

The Winter fuel payment has been reinstated to those pensioners whose income is below £35000 per annum.

My question is How do the government know your income? Do they have access to your bank account?

I haven't looked into this in a great amount of detail but of course I've heard about the 'income above £35,000 do not qualify for the winter fuel payment'. 

I was wondering when they say 'income' is this just income from pensions (including the state pension)?  

I'm genuinely interested if interest on savings, dividends paid from S&S ISAs etc are also included in the £35,000 or not?

Dazed_and_C0nfused

SarahB16 said:

Mariolanza said:

It may have been asked before but I cannot find it.

The Winter fuel payment has been reinstated to those pensioners whose income is below £35000 per annum.

My question is How do the government know your income? Do they have access to your bank account?

I haven't looked into this in a great amount of detail but of course I've heard about the 'income above £35,000 do not qualify for the winter fuel payment'. 

I was wondering when they say 'income' is this just income from pensions (including the state pension)?  

I'm genuinely interested if interest on savings, dividends paid from S&S ISAs etc are also included in the £35,000 or not?

It's not just pension income.  There is a calculator you can use here and as I understand it taxable interest will be counted but dividends paid from an ISA are not taxable so wouldn't be relevant.

https://www.gov.uk/winter-fuel-payment

Mariolanza

Thank you everyone for your help.