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We’ve spent over 1.5 hrs on the phone trying to work out why we have a tax demand from 2014-2016. They can’t prove we have had the historical child benefit payments they say we have had and they want to recoup back but they have still sent a demand for payment. Therefore we have to prove we haven’t had them ... but that sits with another department ... another 45 mins to find out that their systems are new and don’t go back that far! The people I’ll deal with on the phone are always really nice and I appreciate they have a difficult job but this is so “computer says no”. I can’t even rant properly because it’s ground me down with the futility of it all. My employment history and tax situation has been relatively simple and yet I go through something similar each year. How do people with more complicated situations cope? How much time, effort and money is wasted in this shambolic system?
I feel your pain. It is infuriating.
Yep. I'm still trying to get my national insurance record up to date. One issue from 2008 is still ongoing.
hey can’t prove we have had the historical child benefit payments they say we have had and they want to recoup back but they have still sent a demand for payment.
Wouldn't it be easier to look at an old bank statement?
Wouldn’t it be easier to look at an old bank statement?
Yes it should be, and we are doing that, but it’s difficult as we went paperless. Also, that won’t prove that we didn’t receive payment..it will only prove that we didn’t receive payment to that account. I guess it all helps though.
Also, that won’t prove that we didn’t receive payment..it will only prove that we didn’t receive payment to that account.
Didn't even think of that. Should definitely be on them to prove that they paid you, then.
How do people with more complicated situations cope? How much time, effort and money is wasted in this shambolic system?
When I moved to Scotland in 2009 things were a bit changeable. In 6 months I was employed X2, self employed and company director of a company being wound up. Plus tax credits didn't keep up with our information as we 'changed too often'.
Tax: I fought for nearly 18months to get my £2k of overpaid tax back. I was then hit with investigation into 3 years of my self assessment returns (now dating back 5 years...). They found I was 30something pence out in my favour after some wee tax man and his assistant trotted up from Glasgow to inspect all my records for a day.
Tax Credits: 7 years after all this (so now 2016) I was still not clear why tax credits thought I owed them money, after three years of paying back unsubstantiated 'overpayments'. I had a near full Falling Down moment on the phone, followed up by a both barrels and detailed letter with my calculations on. Finally I got some specialist team who within a month confirmed I owed nothing. Still to this day I have no calculations or final letter confirming that I owed nothing.
IMO there is a combination of ridiculously complex tax and tax credit system, staff struggling to understand some of it for themselves and a quiet suspicion that complex = fraud time.
how is it possible to prove to them that you didn't have it if as above it could be paid to "another account"? Surely if you've a record of all your accounts you can show it isn't there. It's easy to search back with your bank or even order an old statement. If you hold 5 accounts and it isn't in any of them then what more can you do to prove you didn't have it? Surely there must be a record of it being paid to you if you had it?
IMO there is a combination of ridiculously complex tax and tax credit system, staff struggling to understand some of it for themselves and a quiet suspicion that complex = fraud time.
Complex doesn't equal fraud, though it does make errors easier to make, on both sides.
You missed out "loss of thousands of experienced staff as offices are closed and centralised, and we couldn't possibly agree to you working from home. What? Covid? Oh shit!"
Don't assume with the HMRC that the onus is on them to prove anything, it doesn't work like that though it would do if things ever went to court.
You could compare their failings with their Charter and then follow up with formal complaint along those lines.
I ended up doing that for the mess they made of child benefit payments some years ago (multiple offices sending letters contradicting each other) and it did solve the problem.
Were due a hefty vat refund after some large purchases last quarter but still not paid back as the HMRC auditor are questioning the vat scheme were on but the other hmrc department responsible will not answer either our or the auditors communications. It's ridiculous.
This thread isn't filling me with joy.
I'm a PAYE employee, but a minor accounting screw-up means HMRC think I owe them something like 1200 extra tax from a previous period.
There seems to be no way to dissuade them from this notion: our accountant is effectively trying to debug their calculations by firing numbers at them and seeing what they do in response. I was hoping it'd all be sorted "real soon now" but this thread is making me question this naively optimistic outlook 🙁
To redress the balance just slightly I haven’t found them too bad over the last couple of years. For various reasons I’ve had a number of employers whilst doing the same job which has played havoc with my coding, but they sorted out fairly quickly - albeit it did take a while (20 mins or so) to get through…
Those requiring bank statements should ask for them as part of a Subject Access Request for a period of time. £10 for the lot rather than each.
We’ve just asked for 24 old statements and no one mentioned a charge - gulp, that could be pricey! I’ve found a letter from 2013 saying we opted out of payments and so I think this is now just going to be war of attrition and finding out what documentation they will accept as proof we haven’t been receiving payments. I’m feeling that we are on more solid ground now, but I’m also thinking that we really need to keep and file everything in this paperless era.
This is why we need a simpler taxation system that is fully transparent of all tax and ni paid.
The child allowance one is a real sh##ty one imo.
We once went through all the hassle of going through the process of applying for tax credits only to be told we were entitled to only a few quid. Wasted everybody's time.
Yes i believe HMRC is the only institution where you are guilty till you prove innocence. If I had a dispute I would just roll over and pay up, dispute it later. Their fines for delayed payments are eye watering, can't blame them really if there were no penalties people would dispute everything.
I've always found them pleasant enough on the phone but utterly impenetrable. I had a demand for unpaid Student Loans payments even though the previous year they'd sent me a letter stating that they were no longer going to take payments because the Student Loans Company had confirmed the balance had been cleared. Months of talking to them and sending various proof didn't sort it out and the demands kept coming. I went to an accountant with all the documentation and it was done within the week.
TLDR - go get an accountant to deal with them for you.
Their fines for delayed payments are eye watering, can’t blame them really if there were no penalties people would dispute everything.
I used to play cricket with a tax man. He had a mildly humorous story from when self assessment came in in 1996. Everyone of course filed their returns pretty much on deadline day and they couldn't cope so were sending out letters saying they didn't have time to look at it properly so would they mind paying X for now and then when the tax office got to it they'd check the numbers and correct it.
The next year someone sent in a blank form with a very nice letter saying they hadn't had time to do it, so please accept cheque for Y and they'll correct it when they had time to get to it.
Of course HMRC framed his letter and sent him a fine.......
Ahh, HMRC!
Where do I start, I'll keep it brief!
Myself and a work mate were in an EBT scheme, all above board until HMRC decided it wasn't.
For what it's worth it was one of the worst tax limitation schemes I was ever on.
Many years later the letters with demands for unpaid tax and interest started, think the figure was around 12,000.
This probably went on for 4 or 5 years and came to a head last year(at the start of lockdown) when I agreed to pay and asked them to send me a final calculation.
They sent me the letter, only problem was it wasn't for me, it was for some other poor soul who was due a lot more than I was.
As others have said always very good to talk to them on the phone but pretty hopeless at updating stuff. So I raised a formal complaint!
This helped a lot I got a dedicated complaint handler who dealt with things on my behalf.
To the point where I had neglected to tick a box and the IHT department said 'tough you'll need to do your own calculation'. After a quick email the handler got the IHT dept to do the sums for me.
If I was you OP I'd raise a complaint and see where that gets you.
Good luck!
We had exactly the same issue. My wife was going round the bend talking to the child tax credit people who were all clueless. Same problem that they had changed systems and had no previous data. We found the letter and that was ok with HMRC, even though it was a letter that said we had opted out when in reality we could have opted back in the following month.
It won't affect you looking at the dates but in the first year we opted out part way through the year. We would have been eligible for half the benefit which was about £500, we only actually claimed £400 but we had to pay back 50% of what we had claimed even though we could have claimed more. Utter madness.
I would add play along with them and be nice on the phone, they have a lot of discretion in how they handle a claim and it makes a difference.
I’ve always found them pleasant enough on the phone but utterly impenetrable.
This, very much this. If you can get through they are usually pretty good although I did have a long running saga with them over company car tax a few years ago that caused some hardship for 12 months. Sorted out in the end though.
When you consider the loop holes available for those that can afford to exploit them and the overly complex issues that can arise it just adds weight to my opinion that the current system is not fit for purpose and needs redesigning from the ground up.
the current system is not fit for purpose and needs redesigning from the ground up.
Not sure any HMRC staff would disagree
I do always try to be pleasant as it can’t be a fun job but I did get exasperated on this morning’s call and said “this proving I didn’t receive things in 2014 is quite tricky, I didn’t receive a monkey either but how could I prove that I didn’t?”. At that point we both agree I should probably just send them what I could and then take it from there.
I think you will be fine now that you have a letter it shows on balance that what you declared is correct
I'm pretty sure the system has been designed to be painful in the hope that many people just give in. The Child Benefit thing is an absolute farce. Headline-grabbing policy that was not thought through properly.
Agree with poly.
In my case they couldn't tell me if I was liable for inheritance tax on the loans!
Oh okay I'll just pay up.
So this won’t result in me getting a refund, as we never claimed child benefit in the first place during the period they were looking to recover payments from, but it should hopefully mean they will stop chasing for the phantom amount. I would like to think going forward that they may have to have evidence of payment before sending demand letters. Crazy system.
Over a couple of years ( I had mucked up taxcodes) I received a demand for payment of £2000 owed tax which I ignored. I then got a tax rebate of £300. then a demand for underpayment of tax of £1500. then another tax rebate for £500.
I ignored everything and have had nothing for 5 years now
tax codes are a dark art. The hmrc will change them, and then ask you to check that they're right, without any transparency as to what or why they've done. I just got caught by them as in 2019-2020 I chucked a £5k into my pension (outside of PAYE) - the HRMC decided that I'd definitely do the same thing in 2019-2020 and so gave me a larger tax-free allowance to manage that. Of course, I wasn't really aware of this, didn't make a payment last year and have underpaid tax by a grand or so as a result.. :/
I've generally been OK with HMRC apart from them giving me 2 Unique Tax References. For the last few years I've filed my self assessment on their favourite UTR, waited for the £100 fine letter for the other, phoned up and explained. Best bit is that I then get a nagging letter telling me to use the correct UTR - which I did!
My mum's tax affairs are worse - she's used a different first name to her birth certificate name for most of her life so her council pension is in a different name to her HMRC account. Every year my brother spends days sorting her tax with HMRC. It always gets sorted in the end though and the staff are great.
I just got caught by them as in 2019-2020 I chucked a £5k into my pension (outside of PAYE) – the HRMC decided that I’d definitely do the same thing in 2019-2020 and so gave me a larger tax-free allowance to manage that.
Years ago I realised I hadn't been claiming the extra 20% for pension payments (as I was PAYE so never did a return), so just wrote to them expaining this. They refunded the lot going back years.
Generally I've always found them pretty easy to deal with. Whenever something isn't quite right with my taxcode etc I just write to them with the details and it gets corrected almost immediately.
tax codes are a dark art. The hmrc will change them, and then ask you to check that they’re right, without any transparency as to what or why they’ve done.
You wouldn't believe how often HMRC staff have a problem with their own tax codes....🤦♂️
I had to phone them this year to claim the extra 20% relief after I paid a few thousand non PAYE into a pension. On hold 20m sorted in 5 minutes.
After reading it a couple of times I understood what the new tax code was doing. It isn't exactly transparent though. And I am OK with numbers.
@bubs - that is interesting. I had a letter from them 6 months ago asking for p60s from the last 8 yrs to see if I went over the threshold. I did last year and had to pay them back some money (I don't do SA).