Effing tax credits ridiculousness!

[SmallDucks]

Very occasionally my self employed husband earns more than we predicted.
We are usually very good at predicting what he will earn and often underpredict a small amount so we don't get paid too much tax credits.

This has not worked this time round for reasons and we owe tax credits. Fine.

We should get £120 a week but reduced it to £49 to pay back what we owe until May next year.
We can't live on such a huge reduction. I asked them to pay less for a longer period (like their website tells me they can do!) and they said no.
Told me to fill out a form of our income and outgoings online instead.
Did that and now all payments to the money we owe have stoped.

For 1 year and it will begin again.

They will not let me pay them back a smaller amount.
But just shift the problem on 12 months.

Another option is to go to UC but they give us less AND we need to pay back tax credits so we'd be just as screwed as we would be if they reduced it to £49 as they had in the first place.

So now we are stuck not paying anything back.

Just save half of the difference between £49 and £120 so next year you have extra money to pay back. You are over complicating it.

Divide the overpayment by 12, save that amount every month, use it next year to pay in full.

If I did that, I we would have £49 a week.

Just as the tax credits had already begun to take from us that we were struggling on, hence why we stopped it.

Worked out that we would be £80 a month worse off on UC.

Op why are you ignoring my message of saving half ?

They will not let me pay them back a smaller amount.
But just shift the problem on 12 months.

Save the smaller amount that you would have paid, then in 12 months you have part of the money

I know they are a horrible trap when you aren't using them very long-term. We were on them when I was unemployed but once we both went back to work we now owe them lots but can't really pay it back right now.

In your situation I'd either pay them back in ad hoc amounts (you can find the bank details online or phone and ask, and use your NI number as the reference).

Or I'd just put the repayments over this 12 months into another account ready to just transfer over.

As it stands for me I have zero interest in my credit rating and never want a mortgage so they're on hold for me. I owe a grand that they've said I owe personally and I told them they could have twenty a month which I'm now paying. I just called and told them what I wanted to pay and they agreed.

This would be ideal.

But they won't do this for me.
I don't see why they can't just take a smaller amount and we can all forget about it, knowing it's going to be paid off eventually.

Ive set up a standing order now and will have to pay back a chunk in a year.

It could be a lot easier than this. It took 4 phone calls with people that had absolutely no idea what the answer was until it was finally narrowed down to "pay back loads or pay back none..."

Have they actually cancelled your claim now?

Claim? We still receive tax credits.

We still owe the money.
They have just put it off for 12 months.

So basically your payments have been reduced by 50% to be paid over two years not one. So problem solved.

Nothing you say about Tax Credits would surprise me. I have been writing to them since February 2nd to tell them we are no longer self employed. So far, two letters, one form, numerous abandoned attempts to call and three actual phone calls and it's still not sorted. One day last week I received five letters from them, all with the same date, all saying something completely different. Three of them about our claim for this year, which, of course, WE AREN'T CLAIMING. Said that in caps just in case someone from TCs is in hearing distance.

UPDATE - it gets worse.

I cant believe how fricking ridiculous this is.

So tax credits have stopped asking for the huge amount back. They have put it on 'hold' until next year.
I set up a direct debit going into a savings account to add up over time and pay some back after that year.

So our tax credits increased again. I noticed by more than I was expecting (but less than originally of course).

They send a letter:

We received your application to explain your income v's your out goings and see you're in hardship. Therefore we have stopped the repayments for now and have increased your tax credits to help you out.

Therefore in June 2023 you will owe a further £823. Totally an owed amount of £3000."

So we will owe them even MORE next year!

where the fuck is the logic in this?!

why won't they just let us pay back some money over a slightly longer period, as opposed to making the situation worse.

WTF.