Malicious information to HMRC

[Maggie4]

I received a letter from HMRC regarding a child tax credit overpayment from 13 years ago. I called them to get more information about the debt.
I was told the debt was a compliance issue as I probed further, I learned that someone at that time, had informed that my son had been taken away from me. My son has never been removed from my care. The call handler wouldn't go further and was told to put in a subject access request.
I am shocked. I think I know who it was, the same person put in a child welfare concern with social services at that time. They visited and closed the case immediately as there was no case to answer.
This person is a regulated professional that acted inappropriately and I had submitted a formal complaint about their behaviour. I believe their actions were in retaliation to that complaint.
I am of the opinion that this is a matter for the police, their employer and regulated body.
But before I go head first into this I was wondering what others think.

Get the subject access request done first.

I work for HMRC (though in tax not tax credits). I am incredulous that they would contact you for an issue 13 years ago and then ‘reveal’ the reason. I would question that this was genuine contact and not some malicious and elaborate scam.

I doubt they’ll even have records from 13 years ago. Dont engage with whatever contact details they gave you. Google it and use that contact info instead of whatever they gave you in case it’s a scam.

Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Are you saying that the HMRC are trying to scam me?

No, someone is impersonating HMRC.

I got the telephone number from the government website .

I find this whole thing hard to believe. In general there are time limits to chase overpayments and events that happened years ago.

It is also very very odd that someone revealed there was ‘human intelligence’ behind it. HMRC staff must never reveal this.

I'm not sure about revealing the reason but HMRC absolutely pursue things from that long ago. My friend received a letter about tax credits from18 years ago. Her eldest is 32. She asked for a SAR and they said the records had been lost so they closed the case.

Well in that case OP should ask for a SAR.

There is no time limits when it comes to HMRC and tax owed, I've checked. She didn't say someone had informed them - those are my words. She asked if my son was absent from me at that time, I asked her what she meant, she asked if he was living elsewhere. Again I asked what she meant - did she mean; living at another address as we had moved house, she said no. I asked if she meant my son was living with a relative, she said no, so I asked if she meant he'd been taken into care. That is when she advised that I submit a SAR. I agree that the SAR won't include 3rd party correspondence but it may provide info on what HMRC departments were involved and their actions.