[Closed] Paying back child benefit

I presume you're self-employed?

I ended up with it being paid back directly off gross by PAYE.

I've been asking for them to remove CB since the changes came in, but my wife was the one that arranged it, and they keep throwing up odd stumbling blocks (like requiring different, previously unasked for info) each time she calls before they can confirm they'll remove it. That's when she can actually get through...

Massively convoluted. I don't see why simply saying "I/we don't want it" isn't enough to cancel it.

It's worth keeping having it and then paying it back, something to do with it keeps your wife from having to make NI payments if she's still claiming CB - but maintaining full state pension contributions.

I think they just change your tax code so they claw it back that way. I think I had the choice of paying off in a lump (for the period where my wife had been claiming and I'd not had my code adjusted) or using next years tax code.

Sorry i dont know but i got a tax refund as i put the right figures in the wrong boxes on my sa form. A cheque came out of the blue, followed a week later by a letter explaining.  I m pretty sure if i had not completed by the oct deadline i would not have got it as they calculated the tax due, not me.

Tbh i have not looked into it as it came as q a shock, welcome though.

I have to log on to my Inland Revenue account and make a payment with a card. You are correct in your assumption that the self assessment is what calculates the value.

I've never been offered the chance to adjust my tax code. Doesn't have to be paid all at once, last year when I had a bit spare I made some pre-emptive payments even before the tax return was in. There's no rush though, assuming you are talking about 2017-18 tax year, it doesn't have to be finalised until next January.

poolman, if I understand correctly that they've give you a mistaken refund on some faulty figures you supplied, I'd be getting that corrected. If they twig the mistake in future years you could be due a hefty fine.

After not having it for about 2 years, they randomly started paying us again then demanded it back.

We have a payment set up to pay a tiny amount back a month interest free.

Has to be said all dealings we have had with them they do appear to be completely incompetent.

Whether you have to pay a lump sum or whether they can change your tax code is dependent on the timings of you completing your self assessment.

I had to do 3 years of self assessment even though I was only eligible for child benefit in the first of those years, before HMRC got the message.

Whilst HMRC aren't great, they are many times better than tax authorities in other countries.

Am i right in thinking its a reduced amount if earning between 50k and 60k then nothing after 60k?

poolman, if I understand correctly that they’ve give you a mistaken refund on some faulty figures you supplied, I’d be getting that corrected. If they twig the mistake in future years you could be due a hefty fine.

Second that - cost me over 2K when they came back to review and collect some tax that I had been told by my ex employer tax had been paid on. It had - at 20%. Fine was more than the sum owed, and there isn't really an appeals process!

Child Benefit is claimed back from your tax account - we stopped once my earnings got to the 'half way' payback point as it was no longer worth the bother - they dropped my self assessment requirement after one more zero sum return.

wrightyson - yes - 1% per £100 of salary from 50 - 60.

My wife was PAYE, was made redundant, new job was over the threshold but we didn't twig.  She got a demand and had to pay by cheque.  Going forward she has to do tax return as they are still sending the CHB payments to us.!

The whole system is a bit shit and needs sorting for dual income houses. Mr and Mrs Smith can earn a nice 99k combined and keep all child benefit however Mr and Mrs Jones who have a combined earnings of 65k lose it all because mr Jones is on 60k.

>I’ve never been offered the chance to adjust my tax code.

Normally if it's under a certain amount they will use the tax code to reclaim it, otherwise you have to write them a cheque..

Yeah agree withe commment about combined income, it takes the piss. Anyway if you do a self assessment early enough I think they can just take it off your income over the year. If you only remember to to it at deadline time you need to pay in a lump sum buy a certain date.

Recently discovered that we fall foul of this, I need to do the assessment but look to owe them £1500 from last year and then need to put most of future payments in a separate account ready to pay back. As above my wife works part time and doesn't get paid much so works much better for some than others. It's all a right PITA.

Also bear in mind that company car P11D benefit figure is included in the income figure as well as any bonus etc (so you get taxed twice in effect because you're already paying BIK tax on this figure...), you can take off your pension contributions from your income figure for CB calc though

I had to do a tax return a few weeks ago because of CB, they claimed I owed them about £1000. I did the return and ending up getting a £800 refund. Not sure how that worked.

Am i right in thinking its a reduced amount if earning between 50k and 60k then nothing after 60k

Yes but that 50/60 is adjusted earnings. With a c2w, some childcare vouchers, parental leave and a reasonable pension contribution you should be ok to keep some CB up until £70k income. (YMMV)

Yep as above know several (accountant) friends who pay additional pension and the like to maximise the amount of CB they retain.

It is a massive pita the first time.  This year I found it surprisingly easy.  I find all the rules so complicated I'm not entirely sure if I am paying the right amount of tax or not.  I just go with the figure the self assessment spits out and pay by card.  Tends to be a nasty surprise in January when I remember I owe the government another £1k (my wife trousers the benefit)

And yes it should be on joint income, another rushed in, ill thought through policy.

Ok thanks i will check their calcs.  Tbh tax stuff gets filed away for a really quiet day.  I was surprised to just get a refund out of the blue, then a follow up letter explining the calcs.

Thanks again, will check now.

They overpaid me a few years ago, ended up with about £800 extra. I called to report the error on receipt of the first payment but they never called back and continued to send me the money until after about 7 months they stopped it.

Instead of trying to contact me though, they went straight to my bank for the full overpaid amount in a oner. My bank called me to say thay'd had the request and for authorisation to fulfil their request and debit my account. I told them no and i've never heard anything since.

Another government shower of shiite the CB office.

The positive is it makes C2W even better value as if you earn between £51-60k and have 2 kids it's equivalent to 18% extra saved

I'm not self employed but PAYE. I'm looking at dropping a day,  which will hopefully drop me below the threshold for paying it back (when I worked out the difference in take home pay vs a 3 day weekend it's a no brainer - just need my boss to sign it off...). Ideally I'll just do a self assessment this year, pay a cheque and not have to do anything  in the future. I'd rather leave my tax code as it is tbh.

I'm on paye and due to bonuses the tax office keep changing my tax code. Our accountant suggested not telling them about being over the threshold and see what happened as my basic is below. Awaits bill.....

We fell foul of this one recently. Had to pay about three year's worth back in one hit, plus a fine. Which was a bit ouchy.

I was aware that child tax credit had been clawed back, but this one had totally passed me by. IMO reclaiming a means-tested benefit retrospectively is just a shit system. If we don't qualify for the benefit, why not just stop giving it to us in the first place?

If we don’t qualify for the benefit, why not just stop giving it to us in the first place?

You can ask them to do that, but they are so not joined up that it takes them ages to work out (by your own tax return) whether you were actually entitled or not.

https://www.gov.uk/child-benefit-tax-charge/stop-child-benefit

Plus, if the did it automatically based on RTI then that wouldn't account for personal pension, etc. We had a nightmare when RTI automatically updated our child tax credits to completely wrong figures (because it excluded anything that wasn't done on payroll).