tax credit overpayments new report published

pepsifurball

He didn't work between school and college. At the time they said he was eligible, but then they wrote to me in September last year saying I had to pay back everything they had paid me since April, WTC and CTC. I changed my job in July and my wages temporarily dropped for 2 months but then went back to the same wage I was on in my old job, therefore surely my entitlement should have been the same.
They are saying that they overpaid me by twice what I should have been getting for 2004/2005 but on my Tax Credit Award notice all the details that I had given them were correct (wages, hours worked, claiming for one child etc).
The problem is you are just left in limbo, not being able to speak to anyone or even get a reply to your letters.

CIS

Its strange. The reason I asked about the work, is that they loose entitement of they start work, even if they then give up work to go to college.

From your wages, you should have got slightly more entilement as your annual wage had dropped slightly.

Ive sent you a Personnal Message.

Miroslav

Saw my MP last week, received copy of letter sent to them today.

Not overly hopeful, but we'll see.

Would suggest to anyone having troubles, go see your MP.

HopeElizzy

We have been fighting the Tax credits office about an overpayment for 3 years in June. They made a major mistake and were paying us wrongly for 6 months - they have admitted the mistake is theirs. They gave us a large lump sum as back payment before they sent any paperwork so we could not have disputed it anyway.

Just a message for other people in our situation - do not give up the fight!!

We started by going the normal route and complained directly to the Tax Credits office and after 18 months were very fed up so then went to our MP. He has been very good and wrote letters and chased the relevant people for us. He has had to admit defeat since the Tax office started ignoring his letters!! He has passed our case to the parliamentary ombudsman. It has been in their hands for 4 months in which time they have sent us 3 letters apologising for the time it's taking. There have been so many complaints like ours that they are overwhelmed.

Watch this space! :rolleyes:

Shez

Yes I can imagine all the MP's now are fed up with amount of letters theyve had over this!

At least knowing that they have been overwhelmed with complaints, makes you realise your not the only one in this situation.

We need to all stick together.

Good luck to everyone.

funnyguy

Do people realise that if you give gift aid or have a private pension you can take it off your final salary earnimngs.For example if you earn £15000 p.a. and pay £50 per month into a private pension{£600}p.a} and give £400 gift aid to a charity you can put down your earnings as £14000 p.a. and get more tax credit. I say this now as we are near the end of the tax year.

Miroslav

Got a letter threatening me with legal proceedings, today

exil

Many Tax credit problems could be solved by allowing TCs to be calculated directly from revenue records, and paid as a credit against PAYE. Would require legislation for this to happen though.

CIS

Just like the working families tax credit system they abandoned for the new system.

furby-2003

Hi, I called the working families tax credit today after getting my wage slip and noticing a £30 difference . The girl on the phone then proceeded to tell me I should have never received this in the first place so will stop it and i shouldn't spend that money. After hanging on for what seemed like ages on my mobile she finally come back and said she was definatly right and i would here from the inland revenue to recover the debt. According to my records I picked up £210 per month for 5 years. Well you work it out. £12600. Im not sure it will be that much but I recon i'm not far off. I only work part-time because of schooling earning little over £11k and my boyfriend is a student. He had to take over the phone call because i was in absolute tears. i could bearly talk. Hes refusing I pay but I just don't know what we can do. I've always told them when ever anything has changed. Ive only just paid off a large debt through working my backside off. I thought september i would be out of it completly. Looks like the government are going to put me back to square one again.