TAX: PLEASE HELP! only earnt £450 expected to pay £88 in tax

[zumm]

Doing self-assessment on-line. Can anyone help? I've always done freelance work on the side of paid employment so I've always filed a tax return.
This last tax year, I was on mat leave.
So I've filed my p60 info (mostly maternity pay) and also my freelance work (a whopping £450).
Why, given that I've earnt well under the threshold of (is it £10000?) - and have paid tax on my work pay - are they charging me so much tax?
Is there some BOX or etc that I'm supposed to tick to alert them to the fact that I'm earning so little?
[I've now left my old job so don't have much cash around - and any cash I'll earn this next tax year as a freelancer will probably only be about £6000)
Ug, thanks v much for any help.

£7475 per year is all you are allowed tax free, after that you will pay a percentage in income tax. Maternity pay is taxable AFAIK.

Do you have any costs you can use to offset your tax, eg for the freelance employment? More info on here

The personal allowance for 2010/2011 was 6475, way under the 10,000 you guessed at.

Can you view the calculation? Are you sure it's deducting the personal allowance (PA)? That is around about £6,500 for 10/11 I think (am on mat leave so a bit rusty!) so if your total income in 10/11 was £10,000 the total tax due would be about £700. What's it saying the total tax due is? How much tax did you pay at source for 10/11?

Oops - 88 is approx 20% of 450. sounds right.

Obviously you've paid the rest by paye. So what you've earned extra is what you're paying the 20% tax on.

But yes, assuming your company deducted tax right, you earned more than the PA with them so the tax due on your SE income would be 20% of the income, ie about £90. Sorry! Do you pay any professional subscriptions or union subscriptions your work don't reimburse you for?

)Ou and Lisaro are both right to expect to pay £88 - how much have you been asked to pay?

)Ou and Lisaro are both right to expect to pay £88 - how much have you been asked to pay?

If you put your 2010/11 gross income into this Online Income Tax Calculator you should be able to see quite quickly if your tax bill is reasonable or not.

Dear All, Thanks very much for all your kind help with this. I now see the reason behind the tax (I'd been sep'g off the two sets of income and seeing the SMP as almost some sort of tax free dole - since I'd done 'nothing' to earn it & therefore didn't understand why I was being taxed for the small amount that I did work for). Damn tho.
Thanks also for explaining that the tax free cut off is in fact 6 or 7 odd thousand (will check).
Cogito, with thanks for the calculator link.
Overall, thanks! I often feel out of my depth where tax is concerned - but in fact maybe it's not so complicated once you think about it logically.
Given I'm now going completely freelance - can anyone recommend a good book to help teach me the basics of book keeping and tax: 'accountancy for dummies' type. Ahem, rock n roll.

Talk to HMRC. They actually run courses for people starting out as self employed. They're actually very helpful.

OK! I assume I just call them up - but (if it's possible) pl let me know if there's a web link you know of. Thanks again!