Pensioner tax demands

mike0124

Hi all, this is my first time here and i was hoping for a little advice concerning my mother
, she has been retired 5 years and has been constantly bombarded with various income tax demands ever since. I have recently found out that she has been paying these bills with her savings totalling a few thousand pounds and as a result she is now penniless and still the bills come. I have had to pay the more recent ones for her just to stop the interest accruing and have told her to take as much info as she has to Citizens Advice Bureau on Monday.
I will post back when i have more info, until then may i ask, does this seem right and does anyone have any idea why this might be.
Any help will be greatly appreciated as it is worrying her greatly.

soolin

Whether it is usual to get tax demands rather depends on whether a person owes any tax or not.

CAB are possibly not the right people to help with this, they might be able to get HMRC to back off for a while, but ultimately your mother needs to get her tax sorted out properly so that she and HMRC can actually see the position regarding tax unpaid or otherwise.

Until such time as full tax returns are completed and any liability is known it is impossible to know whether any tax is owed or not.

Obviously though if these demands are based on tax returns submitted already then yes they will need to be paid, if however they are estimates then get the tax returns completed and assessed ASAP. If tax returns show that no tax is outstanding then you can call of HMRC.

seven-day-weekend

If her total income from all sources is more than her personal allowance then yes, she will have to pay tax.

mike0124

Thanks for the response.

One thing i didn't mention, she was always paid PAYE so she should have always been up to date right to retirement

fengirl_2

I wonder if she was in the self assessment system for some reason years ago and has failed to complete her SA's, even when she no longer came under SA. In these circumstances, HMRC would have been estimating her liability each year.
I would forget the CAB and get your mother to sign a 64-8 form (from HMRC website) to enable you to deal with her tax affiars and then make an appointmetn to go and see someone at her tax office (or your local tax enquiry centre) to find out whats been going on and to sort it out. CAB won't act on her behalf in the way you can - they cna only give advice.

Cook_County

I would suggest a much better option is to use http://www.taxvol.org.uk/ (Tax Help for Older People)

ctm_2

I would suggest having a look at these demands first and see if you can see what is going on. If you then can't figure it out, go and see someone, e.g the people Cook_County mentions, or just ring HMRC and make an appointment to see them.

They won't speak to you without your mothers permission though, so ask her to sign a letter saying she gives her authority for you to act on her behalf regarding her tax.

So, find out what these demands are, then let us know. We may be able to shed some light on it for you if we have a little bit of info.

chappers

Speak to the HMRC they will help you out and get it sorted.How much have these amounts been for and what are they for as stated on the statements.

soolin

Being on PAYE doesn't automatically mean that a tax underpayment can't arise. The coding is based on information that HMRC hold at the time, so if there is just as an example, a payment in from somewhere regularly, or a source of income not taxed at source then it is perfectly possible to have a tax liability arise.

It is even possible to have underpayments due purely to the tax code being wrong, and there was a survey done a year or two ago that suggested at least 40% of codes were wrong.

Like others have said you need to actually work out what tax is being chased, and how it arose. Then youc an double check that against income or tax returns and see whether HMRC are correct or not. Until you do that you have no way of knowing whether payments are due or not.

mike0124

Thanks for all your help.
will try contacting the HMRC and also try the place cook_county suggested and keep you posted on how it goes