Marriage Tax Allowance:

isitme · 15 May 2018 at 1:32PM

Just wondering if anyone can help. I have applied for this allowance via phone in Feb/18 (i am the one transfering part of my allowance to my working wife). The person i spoke to at the time said it could take upto 7 weeks for my wifes code to change and i would would be the one any refund would be sent to. As yet no refund and wifes code doesnt appear to have changed (how do you know when it has), although she is going to check again later today to make sure.

I have rung the tax office since about a month ago but came of the phone confused as the person i spoke to was telling me the opposite on some points ie saying the refund would be paid to my wife and also saying couldnt discus wifes tax affairs with me.

Is this length of waiting time the norm or do i need to contact someone

Any help appreciated.

Dazed_and_confused · 15 May 2018 at 6:57PM

The first person you spoke to was wrong. Anyone who applies for Marriage Allowance can only ever pay the same amount of tax or more, never less.

So you will never get a tax refund as a consequence of Marriage Allowance but your wife could well do.

Which tax years did you apply for?

If it was 2017:18 going forwards then normally a new tax code would have been issued to your wife for 2017:18 and her 2018:19 tax code would be automatically increased as well.

You need to get your wife to check her Personal Tax Account on gov.uk as this will show what her current tax code is and whether Marriage Allowance is included. If it's included the code number normally ends with an M.

She then needs to compare this to her latest payslip (after 5 April 2018) to see if her employer is using the correct tax code.

If she hasn't received Marriage Allowance for 2017:18 (you could check her P60 details to see what tax code was used as a start) then, assuming she doesn't complete a Self Assessment return, the only way she can now get the benefit of Marriage Allowance for that year is by HMRC reviewing her overall tax position for last year. Any refund due would be either sent as a cheque or she will be sent a calculation and be invited to transfer any overpayment into her bank account using her Personal Tax Account.

She cannot get any Marriage Allowance refund for last tax year via her tax code for the current tax year.

If her tax code is wrong for this year she needs to get HMRC to issue an updated code to her (and her employer)

cath21 · 17 May 2018 at 4:05PM

Hi wondering if anyone can help?
i have been supported by my husband since Aug 2016 whilst finishing off a degreee, do you know if students are bale to apply for marriage allowance tax?
thanks

Dazed_and_confused · 17 May 2018 at 4:57PM

Whether or not your are a student is irrelevant.

What matters is what rate of tax you pay.

You need to know your taxable income for 2016:17, 2017:18 and estimate for this current tax year to know if it is worthwhile applying.

Your husband would need to have paid tax and not be a higher rate payer to be eligible to benefit of you applied.

isitme · 19 May 2018 at 9:58PM

Thanks, for the reply Dazed and confused. I applied to have the claim backdated from when this allowance was first introduced so if everything complies with the rules to claim this allowance there must be a refund somewhere either coming to me or the wife. It looks like my wife has had three different tax codes in a short space of time so that will need some investigating. It looks like a telephone call to the tax office needs to be made and to make sure my wife is present so they may talk to the both of us hopefully.

Jules_C · 23 May 2018 at 9:06AM

As the poster above, I contacted HMRC at the beginning of March, and have claimed this back to 2015. My husband's tax code changed immediately, but we are still waiting to hear anymore. I'm assuming they have been inundated with claims due to Martin Lewis bringing it to the attention of a lot of people, like us, who didn't know anything about it. I did read on another forum anticipate an 8 week wait.

sheramber · 23 May 2018 at 1:02PM

This is the busiest time of year for HMRC with tax returns to process and subsequent repayments to be issued a end of year returns from employers to be processed

Lack of staff due to cuts means things take time to be dealt with. Any time scale given is purely an estimate. I have read allow 8-12 weeks.

isitme · 24 May 2018 at 10:19PM

Thanks for the info sheramber, in view of what you have said i will give it some more time before taking any further action.

Marriage Tax Allowance:

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