Child Tax Credit Overpayments

[di0430]

Hi, thanks for the link.
Have now signed it and i will pass this on ok.
Cheers............lets hope something good comes out of it for a change.
Di xxx

[scarlett79]

Hi i dont know if this is any use to anyone,but once watching working lunch last year on tv it was on about tax credits overpayments, a guy was on advising people what to do anyway he said, dont appeal against their decision about overpayments because this apparently meant you were infact accepting the decision on one level, and instesd you should just ring/write and tell them you dont agree. Ithink then thats what you keep doing and tell them how its their fault and so on. Im pretty sure this was what was said as i was in same boat at the time. Idont know if its worth checking out maybe with cab/welfare rights to see what they say.

[di0430]

Hi again.
Please could someone advise me on my sister's behalf the complaint procedures for the CTC ?
My sister had paid what she owed in overpayments back by cheque a year ago and she still receives letters asking for payments !
She does have copies of evidence etc and have wrote to them many times etc, but they are not having it and still deny receiving the payments.
She has made several complaints to the managers dept, and has had enough now, this does not seem to be resolving anything-and the whole repayment balance is paid, so what would be the next step from here ? Any ideas ? Cheers .

[cathbr]

Hi - I am being taken to court to pay back an overpayment which I dispute. The tax office have cancelled my entire entitlement to tax credit for 04/05 because I didn't give them my income information on time. However, when I gave them the information (2 weeks after the deadline) they sent me a provisional notice saying I had been overpaid by around £600. A few months later I was sent a notice saying that my entitlement for the year was nil! I don't dispute there was an overpayment, but I dispute how much. Can they cancel payments for the year even though my income was MUCH less than the £52,000 upper limit for a claim?

[Mushymoo26]

Hi - You need to call them and request that they send you a breakdown of how they have calculated the charges. Also have you check entitledto.co.uk it should give you an idea of how much you were entitled to and perhaps you can then work the difference. I would also fill out a dispute form and see how you go from there.

[cathbr]

Hi thanks, I have now written to them asking what my entitlement for that year should be for my stated income and how they calculate that. I have also asked them if they are saying it is nil because they are penalising me for sending the info in late. I don't think they are allowed to penalise me for sending info in late, only if I don't tell them about things like having a partner, which I haven't.

[chaplinsbabe]

they have tried that one with me for 2005/2006 when my partner was self employed and because he didn't hear back from the tax office until after jan 31st 2006 they tried to make out we were entitled to NO money whatsoever for that year.

I have sent a Data Protection Act request and they have written back and asked me to fill out of their forms which asks me to provide the same info I had already given them. I also wrote to the debt management people to tell them I was putting all monies owed into dispute as I had reason to believe from the info I have that I do not owe the £11000 they claim dating back to 2002.

The debt management team said they came to my house on friday (9th) to discuss how I was going to pay back the money they say I owe. However I was in all day and unless they come disguised as the postman who delivered a second class envelope from them then they are lying.

I am not giving them a penny until they can prove without doubt that I actually owe this money

[cathbr]

Hi - yeah, my delayed info was because I had sent in a tax return in the January and hadn't worked out until then what my total income for the previous year was. In the end, it was not much more than the estimated income I had given them in the September.

Oh well, at least I'll have my day in court. Just hope the judge sees things from my point of view and doesn't just assume that the Tax Credits people are right!

[tartanarmy]

Hi all

Can anyone tell me how to claim money from previous years? I believe I should be able to do this as I was told not to claim years 2004/05 and 2005/06 by the Revenue and Customs in order to pay off an overpayment. They were wrong and eventually wrote off the overpayment.

Also, is it usual for them to claim overpayment for money that has not physically been paid. As I said I had the first year's overpayment written off and didn't claim after that, yet they've sent a letter saying I've been overpaid by £589.

[delboytrotter]

Just a note to let you all know i was succesful at claiming that i was entitled to what the Tax Credits office paid me,
This is what i wrote to them ,

We are sure that the overpayment of tax credits would not have happened if the tax credit office had not made a mistake with our claim and removed our children from our form, when the tax credit office removed our children from our claim form it left us without a claim and our tax credits were stopped completely, my wife then phoned the tax credit office and after several phone calls we finally persuaded the office to arrange emergency payments which were then made on a weekly basis at considerable inconvenience to us which meant we had to make a round trip of 35 miles to pick up a cheque from the Inverness office.
We feel that the error was totally the fault of the tax credits office for removing our children from our claim form and once they had reinstated this which took many weeks and several phone calls which once again we had to pay for we were informed that it was sorted out and that would be the end of it.
We then received a claim for overpayments and feel that as the fault was the tax credit office that we should not be liable for the overpayment and if anything we should be reimbursed for the hours spent trying to sort out the mess that was created by the tax credits office which involved many hours on hold on some occasions and many hours on the phone, this compensation should also include my time spent writing letter to which you have never responded.
I would appreciate if you could bring this to a speedy and acceptable resolution.


It was ture btu it may aork for others just by altering the wording, i know they dont like the idea of compensation for letter writing and stress, in the end they had to pay us back nearly £1200 .

Good Luck

[tartanarmy]

Thanks for that. What is becoming increasingly clear to me is that if you fight, fight and keep on fighting them they'll back down. You just have to stay strong.

My last post is somewhat out of date as I have since contacted them about it and, guess what, one hand wasn't working in tandem with the other and they had a made a mistake. Surprise, surprise.

Oh, and I should say that alongside the money they wrote off they also paid me £30 for stress caused and telephone calls made. Next time I'll fight for more and would advise everyone to do the same.

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[delboytrotter]

Well done, i really agree, i think consumers need to fight for more as our rights are being taken from us by so called ombudman groups etc etc which do nothing. If everyone who reads these forums stands up for themselves then it is only a matter of time until the consumers take it back.
This is our money and i just keep reminding myself, they are taking my money!

[tartanarmy]

It's highly stressful though, but well worth it in the end.
I'm also fighting the Revenue and Customs over something that is their fault and my general feeling is that the work they are doing is wholly inadequate. I think the blame lies with successive governments who have cut staff and funding and given whoever is left inadequate training.

My real worries though don't lie with me getting my money. I'm more than able to deal with these numpties - and should I finally come up against a brick wall I will take them to court. But for every person who is willing to stand up to them how many back down long before the fight is over? This government must be making a fortune from people who are just not up for a long drawn out fight.

[jamiesmum]

Hello
Can anyone help/ shed any light on this please?. I received a call from a debt recovery agency on 10 March this year, saying that they had been authorised to collect overpaymets by the TAx Credit office. It was the first I heard about this so I called the Tax credit helpline. They said that i had been overpaid working tax and child credit in April and May 2004. I had separated from my wife in April 2004 and believe I had told them of this fact, as the May 2004 payment was the last one. I disputed the amoutn they quoted and said that my now ex wife must have been paid some of the money.

They said they woudl send me a breakdown of the amoutns and where they were paid, but said that as it was a joint claim they wanted the money from one of both of us. All i then got in the post was a leaflet expalining how I could appeal against the over payment. Icalled again on 15th March saying i needed a breakdown of amoutns. They said they would send it. Instead I got again another leaflet about appealing. I called again on 24th March and was told these things take a long time.

Im fed up of ringing them ,yet fully expect another contact from teh debt recovery team or court threats as I have made no attempt to send any money.

Not that I want to throw money at them, but I agree I received some money in April and May 2004 even though i was not living at home. This money did go on the family however. My ex also received some money. My ex went on income support for a bit after I left.

I have had nothing in writing as to the amoutns they claim were over paid. I cant discuss it with her as I dont know where she is.

Should i carry on waiting for the breakdown to be sent; should I do nothing or should I gee them up? any advice appreciated. thank you

[catsue22]

The whole overpayment thing is a little confusing isn't it. It's quite difficult to offer really specific advice because I don't know the full circumstances

You really need to take some action though - just waiting for a breakdown may land you in hot water.

My advice would be to dispute the overpayment, using the COP26 leaflet you have been sent stating all the reasons why you disagree that you should have to pay it back. A few things to remember when you are disputing an overpayment though

1. In a joint award both applicants are 'jointly and severally liable' This means that if there is an overpayment you are both liable for the debt. HMRC don't really care which one pays it back as long as it gets paid back. A bit like defaulting on a joint mortgage or loan, the banks don't care how it's paid or who paid it's paid by as long as it gets paid. So no point stating that as you didn't physically receive the money, or as you spent it on the family anyway you shouldn't have to pay it back

2. If your grounds for dispute are (as I think they may be) that you told HMRC of the household breakdown as soon as it happened but they failed to use that information - hence the overpayments, then you must try to be specific about dates. For example, if you separated 6th April and told them this the same day, but received a payment on 9th April, well that is just unfortunate because it is too late to stop the payment to the bank, however if you didn't tell them until 6th May and another payment was received in May, then the delay letting them know will be what caused the overpayment. Therefore a dispute will be rejected. If you told them 6th April, but they didn't process this until 8th May, then that is good grounds. Be specific with your dates.

3. Another possibility of how this occurred could be that you told them in time, and they finalised your award correctly based on the information held on their systems. Hence the May payment could have been a 'balancing' payment. However it is a requirement that a declaration of circumstances is done at the end of each tax year. If you did not do your renewal/declaration for the previous year, the payments in the new tax year will all be fully recoverable. As you separated in April it sounds most likely that both yourself and your ex didn't do the renewal/declaration for one reason or another. A lot of people think they don't need to in your circumstances because they are not claiming as a couple any more. Unfortunately that means an overpayment dispute is unlikely to succeed if this is what happened.

It's quite a complex area, but in a nutshell, you need to remember that if you think you were overpaid by HMRC , completely their fault, and that it was reasonable to assume that you did not know you were being overpaid when you received the payments, then you have good grounds to dispute paying it back. But be specific with the grounds.

I am surprised though that a debt recovery agency is being used by HMRC - they usually attempt to recover tax credit debt from their debt management department, however you must contact them and tell them you are going to dispute the overpayment, and discuss your options with them. They may be able to suspend overpayment recovery for a few weeks while you complete the form and they investigate it, or it may be that you have to set up some kind of payment plan with them while it is being investigated. Talk to them. You don't want to end up in court for the sake of a phone call

And good luck

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[jamiesmum]

thank you catsue22 for this helpful advice. i have talked to them and got no where at all. So now I have written a letter and hope that someone will respond....I dont know what dates i had conversations with them. it was a lng time agao and i have moved house, thrown away paperwrok since then. When my ex made a claim for income support, wont it have been documented then that she was receiving Child tax credits and therefore no longer entitled to both benefits?

[dax]

I have sent off a cop 26 but it has not yet been acknowledged. I recieved a reply to a letter I sent to the tax credits office disputing repayment of overpayments, but no referal was made to the fact that I had not appealed, opting for the cop 26 approach instead. Are these things dealt with in seperate departments which would explain the responce I recieved?

Has anyone any idea also how long the procedure takes to get a reply after having submitted the COP 26?

[catsue22]

Hi Dax


You say you sent a letter disputing the overpayments and received a response to this letter. But you also stated that you have had no comment to the fact that you decided to dispute the o/p instead of appealing against it.

Sorry but I'm a bit confused here - perhaps you could clarify. What did the response to your original letter disputing the overpayment, say?
If you can let me know, I will be in a better position to offer some specific advice

Sue

[dax]

Ok Cat..here's the gist. I disputed the overpayment as my responsibility initially by letter to the tax office. While waiting for their reply, a bill for the amount came, followed by a further bill, amended with a larger amount, arriving the following day. I called to enquire as to whether they had recieved my letter and were dealing with it, which they werent, although it had been acknowledged as recieved. Making my own enquiries online on the TC site, I read I had 30 days to appeal. By now 15 days had passed anyway, and realising waiting for a response before appealing, may limit my own time frame for appeal. I decided to send the COP 26 form instead so as not to jeopardise my chance of having missed the appeal and still stuck in the same boat. Good job I did, as theyve only just replied to the origional letter, 8 weeks later. I am still waiting for a reply for the COP 26.

[dax]

I was advised also that appealing was less successfull than sending the COP 26 form as a general rule, so figured that perhaps it was wiser to do so in my circumstance. Initially my response was to dispute the amount by letter, as at that immediate point i time, I was unaware of the appeal procedure which I latterly found out. The response when it did come, said I was liable for the amount. In my letter I had made various points about my position, they emphasised one of those points, using it as an argument for their being correct. However, I had kept them informed of changes that took place in my circumstances and they made the error in overpaying me. Irregardless of whether, the point they reiterated was correct ( unbeknown to me), the fact is I believed the payments they gave me to be true and correct, based on their accessing me from the information I had provided. The extra point I made, that they played on, was beside the point anyway.