Need Some Advice for my dad Re: Tax Bill

[tranmereforever]

Hello all,

 

My dad was made redundant by his company and received a redundancy settlement which was in excess of £30,000, this was in 2009. He is now self employed. He has received a letter from HMRC saying that the company miscalculated his tax in 2009 and he now has to pay back just under £10,000.

 

They are demanding he pays this back immediately but there is no way he can afford this, he called the helpline and they said he would have to sell his home so that he could pay this and that they will not accept a payment plan- he offered to pay it over 12 months but it was rejected

 

Is this correct? Considering it was the employer who made the original mistake and HMRC have not realised until 2012 it seems massively unfair for him to have to sell his home to cover this

 

He is not arguing that if there was a miscalculation by the company that he should pay it back but is finding it difficult that HMRC are being so unhelpful

 

If anyone has any advice they could give me on this it would be greatly appreciated

[Gbarbm]

Hi

Sell his home indeed!!!!

Tell your dad to write to HMRC and state the following;

 

It is the responsibility of the employer to deduct tax and NI from the payments they make to employees.

He therefore had a reasonable belief that his tax affairs were in order.

Whilst he can appreciate that the tax will need to be repaid, to pay the full amount would put him in financial hardship.

He therefore requests a time to pay arrangement (HMRC will expect an income and expenditure report to be completed in order to substantiate the time to pay arrangement)

[tranmereforever]

Thanks very much for that,

 

I have told him to do that and send it recorded

 

Over what sort of timescales would the HMRC normally accept a payment plan?

[Gbarbm]

Generally speaking it is usually between 3 to 12 months.

HMRC will obviously add forward interest and would probably expect your dad to do income and expenditure details to substantiate the time to pay arrangement