Tax demand for 2008/9 - did you or DH get one??

[whowherewhen]

In March of this year my DH got a tax demand of nearly £2000 for tax for year 2008/9. Did anybody get the same?? Have you paid it or what??

Yes. I had to pay back about £800 for 2008/9 last year. Does your DH send in a self-assessment? Does he still have the information? I went back through my paperwork, had a chat to an accountant, and discovered that - unfortunately - they were right.

My DH can beat that - he got one from 1998 (before we met) for £700 ish which they deducted from money they owed him for the last tax year. Unbelievable - DH said not to challenge it as he didn't want to rock the boat. With HMRC you have to prove you don't owe the £, they don't seem to think it is for them to explain why you owe the Tax

It's just that I think it's terribly unfair to dig this up after nearly 4 years.
Times are very tough at the mo and we'll struggle to find the money. Yes he did fill in a self assessment online and I'm not sure that he's kept any record of it.

HMRC can claim back underpaid tax for up to 6 years. We can claim back overpaid tax for up to 4 years. So a bit of an imbalance in the Exchequer's favour there. Best to keep at least five year's back documents.

6 years? we had a demand form 15 years ago?

Thanks for all your comments. To be honest I thought more of you might have been affected by this because apparently about 45,000 people received demands for the year 2008/9, at the start of this year, owing to a new computer program being introduced and an unearthing of these claims.

Can go back 15 years if person was Director of a limited company, as I recall.

Much longer if serious tax evasion suspected.

When I worked for HMRC company cars seemed to cause the biggest number of underpayments.
Number 2 cause was other income - Pension, Letting Income, Untaxed Band Interest etc