tax credit overpayments new report published

julesmum23

Hi is there anyone that can can give me a little bit of advise?

I have worked in the same place for the last 5.5 years. In that time there has been a change of ownership 3 times. My job has not altered in that time.

Last year I rang them up and said that I will be doing more hours temporarily as my new boss had more work for me to do. I was told that they could not make a new claim on temporary hours I had to call them back when my hours went back to normal.

They never went back to normal, when i had renewal forms I pointed out to them i was working 30+ hours and not the 20 they had me down for refereed them to my call about this the previous year.

The outcome was I had my WTC stopped from April to end of Jan which resulted in an overpayment of just under £2000.

I appealed and have heard today that I have lost as I delayed in telling them about the change in circumstances. I did not delay I told them the previous year.

I rang the office this morning but they could not tell me much as their systems were down to ring back next week.

debsf1

Hi All, Just thought I would add a bit of hope to anyone caught up in the 'tax credits overpayments' web. I have just had an overpayment of over £4700 written off after just over 3 years of fighting. I was taken to court FIVE times by the HMRC and each time they messed up, my requests for the case to be dismissed were overruled by the judge and finally he told me that i would have to repay the overpayment because it was not in his jurisdiction to find against the HMRC. I then contacted the Prime Minister who sent my letter of complaint to Jane Kennedy of the Treasury, I also finally managed to get my local M.P. involved and she also wrote to Ms Kennedy.
Lo and behold I got a letter telling me that as the overpayment had been the result of many mistakes made by the HMRC they would now be writing off the amount they had taken me to court for. There was no apology given for all the stress and worry caused but I have now written to them and told them that I am expecting a full apology from them as well as having the CCJ against me dismissed.
So all I can say to anyone who is fighting the injustice of all this is don't give up for one minute, if you know that you are right and the HMRC is wrong then believe in yourself and carry on giving them as much grief as you can, grit your teeth and fight for the justice that you deserve.:j

Pippilongstocking

Ok so am not alone, this is good.

Am however very scared - had a tax credits underpayment (seemingly) and the lovely TC folk put 2684.07 in my current account, shocked and stunned i phoned them as had not a letter etc. (saturday)

Lady on phone assured me that I was def due the money from a 2003/4 underpayment of that amount.

Spoke to her supervisor who said the same, so having been reassured I moved the money into my internet saver, thinking well better there until i figure it out. (saturday)


Monday morning the money is withdrawn from my now empty (its in the saving account) current acount - putting me over 3 k overdrawn, bounced my switch payments from the weekend etc when tere was enough funds in.

Fight with bank and wtfc folk on the monday as the bank want the cash back and the wtfc (5 differnt folk) tell me its my money i was underpaid and they havent recalled the payment. \stood firm with the bank, and guess what.

Turns out oh yeah it not an underpayment its an overpayment, so money was sent by mistake, then taken back (but it was gone by then) and by the way they want it back from me -

SO now i have no idea what tc i am getting cos they have miraculously reduced and I dont know even how much I am paying htem back by - anyone any idea what to do

they gave me money
took it back
and then told me I was due them money ...........dont know what to beleive
now - i have a letter saying i was due the money todays post ergh

forest6

Can we not get this whipped up in the media and see if they do anything.

I'm reading all these post but not seeing any light.

My brother and his wife have been told they owe £1700. They are borrowing about £500 per month from my mum just to pay bills and eat without the government making things harder for people because they mess up. Seems they are doing alot of messing up lately.

My brother has a high paying job but still cant make ends meet. He's on a fixed rate mortgage so no help from the base rate cut and a house thats no sellable.

savvy

forest6 - The Tax Credit Casualty forum are doing just that, hence the reason I posted the posts before regarding Westminster

Caz3121

some advice needed please on whether to keep fighting.

I seperated from my ex end June 2005 and moved out of the fmh with my daughter. Not a good time and at the time and I admit I did not write to inform them of the change (he didn't work so income did not change) and it was not seen as as much of a priority as getting away from an abusive relationship.

He made a claim for IS in July and said he had sorted TC out and there were 4 payments made for about £995 total which I did not know about. These went into a joint account but I had moved everything to my own account and only he used it (but bank would not take my name off it)

He attacked me at the start of August 05 and I have never spoken to him since with the divorce contact all through solicitors.

My daughter moved in with her father (a bad time - but social services would not help as she was 16) and I transferred CB and wrote to tax credits with the full info them to explain and to get them to stop paying.

They are saying the £995 was an overpayment due to the fact I did not notify them of a change of circumstances and I must pay it back. My argument is that they made these payments in error in July (I can only assume on information my ex gave or just by an error on their part)... previous payments had been around £50 so they must have had a reason to make these additional payments.

As with the £5k overdraft he ran up on the joint account this will no doubt be down to me to pay off. (I had to take a loan to pay the lot off as he would do nothing) I offered half and they said I need to pay it all (they say he has been sent the letters too but can guarantee 100% he will have binned them not caring about threats of court action etc)

Surely if this overpayment was due to the fact that I did not inform them I had left at the end of June until Sept then the overpayment should have been 3 months @ approx £50. Instead they made additional payments (that I know were incorrect) so it is these they want back.

I fully accept there was error on my part in not telling them of the change until 3 months later but they have not explained why they made these payments. I am assuming they will continue to chase me alone for this (letter today says no appeal)

Should I continue to dispute?
Anyone been successful in paying half?
If I have to pay can I offer £50 per month?

sorry to ramble...not even if I got any of this money!

Smamfer

:rolleyes: And another victim reporting in... Its a joke isnt it!

My story is not as bad as many of yours and i sympathise with all of you trying to sort this mess out.

I have received wftc from day one when i was entitled to it as i have always been a working single mum.Every single time i had a change in circumstances i would let them know instantly, noting times /dates/people i had spoken to in my diary, I have always gotten my forms back in time with the exact information in them and rang them up after checking everything was ok. I have procided p45's p60's and wage slips to make sure everything was right.

In april this year i got my new awards to be told i owed them £900.
2 weeks later i get a letter saying i owe them £1500

On my bad side i accepted it, not knowing all this was gong on and they dropped my money down saying they were taking it weekly. I recently changed addresses and got in touch with them to let them know i also asked for a letter of confirmation of my letter i had sent them and a reason why i owed them.... heard nothing back
I wrote again... heard nothing back
I rang them yesterday to be told....
They currently have a back log of 6 weeks if you want them to say " yes we have your letter about your address change"
They currently have a back log of 10 weeks if you want them to tell you why you owe them money!
Anyway she said they had received my letter and then went on to discuss my " overpayment"
She tried to tell me that in july 2007 i changed jobs, which i did and i told them. Now it states in their t&c that if you are starting a new job within 7 days you do not have to tell them you are out of work as such as it still counts. I rang them and told them i would be starting in 10 days time they said this was acceptable and to call them again when i knew what i would be earning/hours etc.
I contacted them on my start date,, i contacted them on my 3 month probation date as money changed, and i contacted them on pay rise day too. Keep them informed i thought, no backlog... This silly bint on the phone tried to tell me that i owe them for the " 3 days" i went over the " 7 day allowance period" and that i didnt give them my paye emplores ref number,, which i KNOW i did! She said i should have handed it in in July when starting my new job but instead i rang them up with it in Feb 2008!
I then gave her times and dates of my phone calls what i said and who i spoke to,,
"yes she says we have all that on the system but you didnt tell us your paye ref" ... i said.." did you not think to get in touch then if you are saying i didnt give it to you and ask for it? and why did you carry on paying me money that i shouldnt have had if you was then going to claw it all back"... she couldnt answer but went on to basically call me a liar and say that their computer system was very good and notes are NOT forgotten to be added. I added at this point that a computer is only as good as the person putting the infomation in it and notes can be easily missed. I also stated how it was ok for agencies to be losing our important infomation and yet we dont have a leg to stand on when we have proof of our calls etc. Once again she wasn't impressed. I also said people are writing to their mp's about the way hmrc have messed things up... she stated none of this was true !!! :rotfl:( i nearly gave her the link to this thread)
Anyway she then said that she had updated the system and i have to ring back friday to see if...
a) i owe them any money
b) as they have been taking £11 a week from me, if this has cleared any money i owed them...( which i never did in the first place)
c) whether they owe me....( this could be dangerous)

I have worked out i paid over £300 pounds back to them this year alone since April and yet didnt actually owe them anything.. Fingers crossed it comes back

Sorry its a long one my fingers fancied doing some dancing xx

slavetothetaxman

I have been fighting them for over 4 years!! They sent me a letter stating they were sorry but they had mis calculated our award and that it was their fault but we must pay back more than £6,400.00!! I have repeatedly asked them to explain how this happened but they won't. There is no way we can pay this back. What can we do if they have admitted it was their fault but won't stick to what the government promised, that if it is their fault we won't have to pay it back? Can we take action against them for changing their mind? Their code of practice states that if you can prove it was their fault and that you believed the calculations were correct you don't have to pay the money back, but they have gone against their own code of practice so now what? We have almost had a breakdown over this but we have to pay for their mistakes!! Any advice on what to do next anyone?

suja1983

I was overpaid last year by tax credits, through no fault of my own. I gave them the details of the year before's income, and then when I started working in Oct 2007, I did ring them and tell them, but they carried on paying me.
I quit that job in April 2008, and when I rang tax credits to update my records, they said that considering the income for 07/08 was higher than my income for 06/07, it meant that I had been overpaid. I was being paid £7.00 something from April onwards as a result of the overpayment, even though I was self employed and only working 16 hours a week. When I rang them in September to tell them that I had given birth, they even stopped paying me the £7, again as the result of overpayment. So right now, when I really do need the money, I am living off my maternity allowance of £117 per week. :mad:
Is there any way I can claim something back from them?
Any help would be much appreciated.

Suja

Maybeanotherday

I came out of an abusive relationship and let the tax credits people know so they opened a new claim for me....nothing heard 1year plus then suddendly I got a bill for £700 child tax credit and £900 working tax credit. I read the letter carefully and it had my ex's tax number on too.
I called them they stated it was because my ex had earned more than we had told them???

I asked what I needed to do next they said I had to contact him to sort this debt out....that last person I wanted to speak too!

But I did as I was told,he told me they had also wrote to him but had said they needed a certificate (p60?) of his earnings and the overpayment might be wrong it could have been less???

Anyway I left it with him as he instructed then I got a baliffs letter for the FULL overpayment I called them and they told me to get a loan!!!!
Not sure what to do I visited the citizens advice and they pointed me to my local MP.
I got a very poliet letter back from tax credits saying sorry about the suggestion of me getting a loan (single parent on my !!!! blacklisted noway I'd get one anyway!)
BUT I still had to pay the full amount.... I called them and asked and what about him? would he get away with not paying?? They basically said yes!

So I was naughty moved house and didnt contact them again.....

Then they contacted me at my new address asking for the money back,I was heartbroken it followed me but should have known better!!

I spoke to a nice lady on the phone who managed to sort out a minimum payment with me and I said I didnt see why I should pay the full amount as the working tax credits went to his wage and the child tax credits went to my bank account so if anything thats what I was willing to pay.
The lady on the other side of the phone accepted this...told me he hadn't paid anything yet either (naughty naughty!).

So the plan.... I talked this through with her and she basically said after a long conversation that if I paid back half then refused to pay the other half and let them take me to court I was more than likely to havr the rest of it waivered!

NOTE: If you pay the full amount back and then suddenly your ex pays the other half YOU DO NOT GET REFUNDED! Tax credits get the lot!:eek:
Makes me very:mad: especially when I have not been paid a penny of CSA another government scheme which stinks...he gets to roll around dodging tax credits as he hasn't any need for applying now and knows this he said the same to me!
Total debt left to me: £5500 not to mention the lack of support for his now 5year old daughter!
Sorry for the rant! Thought it might help some folk left in the same situation!