Mrs is having trouble with the tax office, she is currently a student, in her previous job she was PAYE but had essential car use and could claim for mileage, due to not being the most organised person and it not being a vast sum there were a few odd months where she didn’t claim for mileage. Tax office sent a letter to say she owed them some money. She contacted payroll who said “we’ve done all your tax codes it’s all fine you shouldn’t owe anything”, contacted HMRC and was told to do a self assessment. She tried to fill in the online assessment form but you need a code, contacted HMRC again to get a code was told you shouldn’t have to do this but we’ll send a code to you shortly. Time passed and no code, she asked again and was told will be with you shortly, meantime she misses the deadline and incurs a charge/penalty ~£86, phone HMRC “ah it’s all a mistake, no need for assessment we’ll sort it”. Coupl eof weeks later another letter to state the charge has now increased, call them up “mistake, we’ll sort it” short while later we get a letter from debt collection agency. Once again assured by hmrc on the phone that it is all a mistake and now we’ve got yet another letter from debt company. Call debt company but obviously don’t have any details of her case and told all questions should be directed to the taxman, call HMRC this time get a stroppy person who basically calls my wife thick then hangs up on her. Been to CAB but they said we don’t do tax stuff, given details of another company who my wife is contacting today.

Getting vexed and the charges keep going up, mrs did offer to start making payments to the stroppy sod she spoke to last time but the amount was deemed too low and refused.

Any ideas WTF is going on and how we can get this sorted. As I said almost everyone she has spoken to at HMRC has said it’s a mistake but the letters keep coming and the charges are several hundred pounds now and presumably still climbing.
I assume the tax office thought when she wasn’t claiming mileage some months then she shouldn’t have been getting the essential car use thing, not 100% on this tho

Can’t be of any specific help other than to stress the importance of taking a name, office and number whenever you talk to HMRC. Also, ask for written confirmation of whatever they’ve told you. You’d be amazed (or not) how often staff fail to log calls properly.

Call HMRC and ask to speak to a manager and raise a complaint. Log every interaction and communication.

If it’s literally just mileage (or pension if higher rate tax) or both of these then you don’t need to do a full assessment. That said, if you requested a code that means you asked to fill one in and therefore do now have to fill one in regardless. It’s an odd rule but you just have to go with it.
From their perspective, sending you the code is asking you to fill it in. This isn’t clear at your end so tell them you were never asked to fill one in and they should drop the charge. Last year they dropped all late fees completely and I thought this year too.
To adjust your mileage or pension you can call and do it over the phone as a one off, or there is a form on the site (which the phone call will confirm the correct form). As I said though, only if you don’t yet have a code.
With HMRC it’s good practice to write down the time, date, length of call and who you spoke to, as well as what was discussed/decided, and keep ALL letters in a dedicated folder. That way you can “prove” how things look from your side.
In all my dealings with them they have been fair, reasonable and competent. Slow as molasses but no actual issues other than they tried to charge me for a year I didn’t submit until I pointed out they never asked me to; they then dropped the charge.
Hope that helps.

Low rate tax, all paye. I don’t think, mileage is the issue, I think it’s the “essential car use” that triggered it. Dunno if there are rules and minimum reqs for this, maybe she didn’t log enough miles for it or maybe the months she didn’t claim for mileage HMRC thought she wasn’t using the car so shouldn’t have got it.(???) Her colleagues doing the same role didn’t have an issue but maybe they did all their mileage claims. <edit>The way it was originally explained to me sounded very much like she was getting into trouble for not claiming mileage, but I’m sure there must be more to it than that.

Mrs has been taking notes from phone calls made, dunno how detailed they are, and kept all correspondence and notes together. They told her to do the self assessment, she certainly didn’t want to do it and her payroll told her no need. Possibly duff advice from that particular person at hmrc and then everything else has stemmed from that.

Therein lies the problem of using modern communications to do taxes. When it starts to go titsup you need to write (keeping a copy for reference) and use the post.

I’m no expert, but I have to say I only had any issues once I started doing self assessment (child benefit related) as a PAYE. If you can get any documentation to avoid it I would do so.

Call HMRC and ask to speak to a manager and raise a complaint. Log every interaction and communication.

HMRC are comically incompetent. The most useless bunch of hairless apes you will ever have the misfortune to deal with. I’ve had regular run ins with them over the years. As a typical example…. you could have an hour long conversation with someone to resolve an issue with say VAT, then you’d get a letter a week later about the same thing. You’d ring them back and there would be no record whatsoever of that conversation ever having taken place, or anything resolved…

Repeat until tearing your hair out. Its like groundhog day.

I learnt that theres only one way to ensure this doesn’t happen. Forget phoning or emailing. Put absolutely EVERYTHING in writing, and send it registered post

HMRC are not out to do you but they are from my experience incredibly disorganised and have contradictory IT.

I got told by work I had to do a self assessment… and I agree 100% with brassneck. …^^^

Initially I filled out a form to be given self assessment then they wrote me a LETTER saying they couldn’t give me my unique code (UTR) as they were missing information from the form…

I then went and tried the form again (twice) and there is NOWHERE on the form to provide the information they asked for…

A LOT of phone calls and for some reason I had been put (marked whatever) in a special group for non-UK citizens…. and I got told to call them directly… (different 0300 number)

I did, ignoring the fact the 5 minute intro tells me I’m calling the wrong number unless I’m a foreign national and get through after 10-15 minutes ….

When I finally did get through the nice person on the end confirmed I was marked incorrectly BUT then went on to sort out a lot of things like my UTR and re-flagging my file as domestic etc.

All I can say is try and get as much in writing as possible and keep records.

I’m sure they know HOW messed up they are … and to be fair.. they are usually fair if you can provide them some evidence you have done everything possible..

As per binners. Completely under-resourced to do the job. I mean, look at the website – it now flicks between two different sites with joyful abandon.

Website doesn’t allow for solutions in my opinion and different staff will offer different interpretations.

Assuming it is all a big mistake from HMRC what’s the chances of getting the charges dropped? Or atleast dropped back down the the initial late self assessment (which probably wasn’t actually) needed fee? Do they eventually say “oh shit yeah, sorry, slate wiped clean” or do they continue with “we are the law”?

Mrs spent the morning (lines only open 2hours a day) redialling the number for this help organisation, didn’t get through. Grrr.

In my experience, once they’ve established that they’ve ****ed up yet again, you just don’t hear anything. No letter of apology, no explanations, nothing. They just stop demanding the money they’d previously been demanding off you.

Seriously fella… forget trying to resolve it over the phone. You’re just wasting your time. Forget phoning or emailing. Put absolutely EVERYTHING in writing, and send it to them recorded delivery, because they WILL lose it, but then you can at least prove that it was delivered

Assuming it is all a big mistake from HMRC what’s the chances of getting the charges dropped? Or atleast dropped back down the the initial late self assessment (which probably wasn’t actually) needed fee? Do they eventually say “oh shit yeah, sorry, slate wiped clean” or do they continue with “we are the law”?

Mrs spent the morning (lines only open 2hours a day) redialling the number for this help organisation, didn’t get through. Grrr.

Ultimately they are the law …. or fighting it they might as well be. (Fighting against them is not a great idea unless you’re loaded)

However … in my experience SO FAR if you ask for help and say you are doing everything etc. it seems they can at their side pretty much set any “status” … the trick is getting through… then try to keep them on the line and write down everything (including other numbers) …

My guess is they can make fines/changes disappear but what really matters is getting some sort of closed/complaint status and what flags are set for your UTR (Unique Tax Reference).

It’s a half cocked system and doubtless they are flooded with confused people 99% of them simply trying to pay the correct tax.
My understanding is that they added lots of extra people this year that suddenly have to fill out a self assessment… and frankly we have no clue as to the process and the information about it seems contradictory!

Are you/her dialing 0300 200 3300 .

Under resourced, undertrained, underpaid and short of everything that you need to effectively run a modern organisation.
If you want to reduce waiting times on the phone, call before 0900.
And yes, make notes; lots of them. The vast majority of the call handlers are human and will do what they can to help sort out your situation, so treat them with respect and you’ll get the same back.

A brilliant apraisal of HMRC from the Mash 😆

They’ve been sending me demands for NI due for someone who left my employment two years previously.
First time I rang them a woman said that I needed to submit a new return using their Basic PAYE software (which I didn’t have an idea how to use). I left it and eventually did an online chat thing and the woman said ‘oh yes, I see they’ve put the wrong date in…. I’ll fix it’ and that was that, done.
I kept a copy of the conversation transcript just in case but it’s case closed.

Worth trying the online chat.

cheers for the info everyone, have been using the 0300 number, will try letter and the online chat thing

I have to say I’m impressed that you lot have had such luck getting through to someone to talk to. I spent ages and ages on hold a couple of years ago to try to resolve an issue with paye returns and finally gave up and wrote a letter

My wife was sent a late payment fine for paying a bill one week after it being issued! We appealed and it was eventually dropped.

They do seem a bit incompetent, but eventually it all gets sorted out.

Use this number – 0161 931 9070.

Shorter queue, more knowledgable and pleasant staff. Give it a ring, explain the problems. Has worked out well for me in the past.

Use this, chances are you’ll get it sorted fairly easily.
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/hm-revenue-customs/contact/complain-about-hmrc