child benefit stopped after address changed

[tcandido]

hi everyone, I will try to explain my situation as simple as I can, apologise if the story is too long...

 

first, a year and a half ago I moved home and forgot to tell hmrc straight away, I was remindeed by the tx credits renewal packs that were sent out to my friends and gave them a call straight away and explained the situation. At the time the advisor was very understanding and we did the changes over the phone. I asked her if I needed to call child benefit as well and she told me NO, records would be updated for both offices.

 

Since then I have been getting letters from hmrc normally, child tax credits and child trust fund as well. I never thought to doubt for a moment that all was all right.

 

However, last month I accidntally noticed my child benefit payments had stopped. I rarely go out looking for the payments unless there is a problem, have all my bills on direct debit etc, so pay little attention to my bank statement. turns out the last payment was on the 29th of may 2012.

 

I first contacted the office online as getting through the phone was taking ages. Few days later I got an email from them telling me my payments had been stopped due to a letter that I did not respond to and Id have to start a new claim.

 

not happy with that short response I emailed back but never got any more contact. so yesterday I called the office. the advisor asked for my details to confirm my identity, there and then he assured me he had my correct address in hands, the present one. So I briefly told him my story, he kept in silence as I talked and when I finished only told me "well there is nothing else you can do apart from starting a new claim". I asked to be informed of when they sent me any correspondence as for what i can see they have my correct adress so it all sounds like a mistake to me. he said he cant tell me when because the letter could have been sent from any hmrc office, to wich i replied thats impossible, I had ust gotten ff thephone with tax credits office to make sure all was right there. he told me many things could have happened including a mistake from the post man. I said "what????" he said, yes, you never know the postman could have dropped your letters in another house, I said then how does that make the whole thing my fault? and how many letter were sent out until ending on my benefit being stopped that the postman delivered wrong? The advisor kept telling me in a ery rude mannner that hes wasnt saying it was no one fault but that there was nothing else he could do, trying to get me off the phone.

 

I insisted for an explanation though. I asked him for a bit of understanding from his side to my question... how is it if they have my present adress my benefit could have been stopped over lack of response from my part???? if I never got any letters from them? he advisors, shckingly, asked me how did I know I did not ge any letters? I said to him he must have been joking there, because, obviously, I live in this house and get all the letter, and there wasnt one from child benefits. He went on to say about postman mistake and taht perhaps the offices were late on communicating the address change between them but there was no way we could know what happened.

 

i asked further questions, like, if the office does not keep records of all mail sent out or when the address change in his system took place, that sure would have been recorded, to all he replied he did not know the information and few times told me "i dont understand what you want from me".

 

Leaving aside the poor tratment I got over the phone yesterday, I also did not get an answer to my problem. I told him I believe my payments shoud be backdated to when they stopped because this was clearly a "postman mistake" or miscommunication within the department, wich is a bit strange since at the end of the day, they were communicated of my new address and got all my information correctly. Overall, I told him, there is no explanation or reason of why my payments woud have been stopped, and he could not tell me more than I did not reply to mail sent out to me. wich I believe is no good enough excuse, since they have my present address and sure would have taken more than one lettter missed for the to stop it all together, so its also hard to believe the "postman mistake" theory.

 

after about half an hour on the phone with the man, I told him I would not get off the phone until he would give me more than "nothing else I can do", because I cant accept this type of treatment and unfair decision, he told me in a very spiteful manner he had already told me wha to do minutes ago, wich he had not, and he would pass my complaint to head office. I was shocked, never before I had seen such rudeness and lack of empathy from a HMRC advisor on the phone, any other call I had made before was spotlessly dealt with and politeness and professionalism always there, not to fault!!!

 

I do not know what to do next and how to act. Another hour call like that and another advisor playing like that to me on the phone, its very frustrating

 

any help will be very much appreciated!!

[EagerElephant]

Can you make a new claim asap so you are at least getting some payments and deal with the cancellation of the claim at a later date?

 

Once a CB claim is closed you only have 30 days to appeal it so you are way out of time.

 

Get the new claim in payment and then start with the complaints otherwise it is more money you are losing out on that might not be backdated.

[tcandido]

Can you make a new claim asap so you are at least getting some payments and deal with the cancellation of the claim at a later date?

 

Once a CB claim is closed you only have 30 days to appeal it so you are way out of time.

 

Get the new claim in payment and then start with the complaints otherwise it is more money you are losing out on that might not be backdated.

 

Hi, thanks for replying.

 

Yes I have started a new claim yesterday. The advisor assured me that was the only thing to be done at this point so I went on with it straigh away.

[EagerElephant]

Excellent!

 

Once the CB is back in payment you can write your letter of complaint.

[assisted blonde]

I cant understand how any one can miss their payments not being paid for a year, weather you read your bank statements or not you must have realised at some point you didn't have as much money as you thought?

[scotgal68]

I agree, no CHB for a year? If you've only one child that's over £80 a month you've not noticed. Write a letter stating your reasons for backdating request

[Petana]

Hi, can I ask if you were successful getting backdated payments? I am in a very similar situation and I was told that the payment might be backdated but wasn't told how far