Help trying to work out what my earnings are for child tax credit

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I thought this would be so easy!!!

I've submitted my child tax credit form by following what they've told me to do which was my gross salary from my p60.

However I'm really confused if I've given the correct figure because of schemes my company run.

My pay slip looks like this
Basic pay = x amount
Holiday pay y amount
Pension z amount
Gross pay is x-y-z= a

The holiday pay is a scheme the company run whereby you can buy annual leave. Therefore I buy 5 days annual leave and pay it back at y amount per month.

Then I have a part on my payslip called deductions, on here it shows
Paye b amount
NIA c amount
SIP d amount. (Share incentive )
Total deductions =e
Therefore my net salary is the gross pay(a) minus total deductions(e)

So I'm completely lost now. My p60 gives the total of my gross salary which is what I've put on my tax form. However online I've read that because I pay into a Sip scheme I have to add that amount onto my gross amount and put the total of both on my tax credits. This seems odd to me because it's included already in my gross amount so surely if I add it back in ill be over inflating my gross salary.
Also because I buy leave which is deducted from my gross salary I also have to add that back in???

I'm sorry I'm so confused. I've rung the helpline but they didn't seem to know.

My original thought is that as I'm buying annual leave it's the same as me requesting unpaid leave from work and if I did that my salary would be reduced and therefore I'm right to keep my gross salary as it is, and my sip is included it the gross so why would I need to add that back on.
but who knows. I'm lost!!

Then the other question is as my Sip has matured it means each month I get back shares, which is what I paid into the scheme plus shares the company give me. So do I need to include what they give me as a extra earning?

Thanks in advance, sorry for the mass of questions

It might be a good idea to call the Tax Credits helpline and ask them for help if you haven't already. The system is really confusing but I wouldn't think you have to add things already included in your gross salary bqck to it as surely that would artificially reduce your entitlements?

I think you are overthinking this. Its about taxable pay. So gross pay minus pension contributions which aren't taxable. So I presume its x-z. The other things are things you are choosing to spend your money on (buying holiday, share incentive etc).

But I would ring tax credits again to check.

In terms of shares, you need to declare taxable income, so share dividends, but not the fact that you have more shares.

The CTC manual is online, so you can look through this, the answers should all be here. (Somewhere.)

www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/tctmanual/index.htm