child tax refund

dogsnobby

has anybody seen or done this???

http://www.taxrefundsdirect.co.uk/default.aspx

System

There are various threads at the moment about these type of firms offering to do a job for you that you can do perfectly easily yourself. They even have to cheek to take a cut over whatever is refunded. I've seen some of these companies taking up to 40%.

As had been said in the other threads - if you think you might be due a refund from HMRC, say because you never claimed for cleaning a uniform or paying professional subscriptions etc, then write to your tax office and ask for yourself.

Cook_County

If you need tax advice then the sources of advice are:

HMRC

TaxAid http: www.taxaid.org.uk/

Tax Help for Older People www.taxvol.org.uk/

Chartered Institute of Taxation www.tax.org.uk/

The company you mention are unqualified and I would personally not use an unqualified tax adviser any more than I would use an unqualified dentist!

Hoddie_2

Have you seen their terms and conditions?

The fee is charged at 30% + vat of the gross refund received and only applies on a no win no fee basis. i.e. no charges are made in the event that no refund is secured. A gross refund is defined as the total of all monies recovered whether those monies are a repayment or to offset outstanding liabilities to HM Revenue & Customs.

So you're due a repayment of £2000 for 06-07, but owe £1950 for 05-06. HMRC send you a cheque for £50 but TRD charge you fees on the £2000!

A surcharge of £50 is applied to refunds under £700.

Which in my experience most are!

If a customer does not have a tax record with the revenue and a temporary record needs to be set up in order to review the repayment claim and issue a refund, a charge of £50 will be applied.

Which is technically a fee on those visiting from out of the UK - and why they charge it is beyond me, setting up records is the responsibility of HMRC and TRD have no involvement in this process.

Should customers request a bank transfer to a UK or overseas account, a charge of £20 will be applied.

Charging £20 for something that costs 6p (BACS between UK accounts). Nice.

I understand that Taxrefunds Direct have sole discretion and may desists from progressing my claim further at any time

Which means if you're only due a small amount they'll stop helping you. This would worry the hell out of me - they could have your P60s and other documents but will no doubt also have registered as your agent with HMRC, meaning they will be sent copies of all documents HMRC issue to you in future - unless and until you ask them not to (which I'm sure TRD won't tell you).

In summary, there isn't a single repayment they deal with that any reasonably competent person couldn't claim themselves.