A letter from Concentrix oh behalf of HM REVENUE

[Howes68]

Hello please help if you can , I am worried sick , I got a letter from the above , the letter states We need to talk to you about whether you are living with a partner , I claim tax credit as a single person , they are saying that they have evidence that there may be another ault living with me , I do have a bf whom stays 3 days a week , they wish me to call , and are asking in the letter for Bills, tent from 06 April 2014 to Jan 2015 , scared they are going to horrible on the phone not sure what to make if it , feel sick , any tips or help would be great thank you

This is fucking ridiculous now. These idiots are worrying people sick. I've had the "all clear" re- self employment, but i'm just waiting for my single parent one now I cannot believe these absolute dickheads are saying they can't differentiate between flat A & flat B?? What can we do, collectively, about complaining? This isn't right, life is hard enough.

This Government Cameron just wants to wipe single, self employed Mothers off the face of the earth by the looks of it. Actually, just single mothers in general. Twat

It's kind of ridiculous to say they are going to look at the bank statements of single parents to see if they receive regular money that is not wages. Single parents are SUPPOSED to have regular income of this sort - child maintenance!

Thats mine all sent. . I didn't give them my maintenance letter payments as has nothing to do with them . . And I explained to them on my letter that I do not have to disclose such information to them . Which is true.!! let's see the outcome. I will still complain though !

I've been subject to a compliance investigation by HMRC and had 5 months of stress and anxiety, with them today making a decision completely in my favour. I found the Tax Credits Casualties and CPAG websites helpful. Happy to discuss further if that would help.

Today 23:57 muircm

I'm so relieved to hear that so many other single parents have received the same letter as i did ie from concentrix on behalf of HMRC saying that they have evidence there is another adult living with me, i hav bn in such a panic about it as i do live alone and am so worried they wont believe me! When i called the number on the letter it took me almost a whole day to get through, i followed up from the call sending them by recorded delivery all of the documents they asked for. 2 weeks later ive had no reply, the letter sd to wait 10days before calling again. Today it took almost an hour in a queue before someone answered only to tell me to call bak nxt wk, i refused stating that i'd spent so long waiting for an answer i wud like an update now. The response was that they have a backlog and not received my paperwork. I said it was sent recorded delivery and signed for almost 2 weeks ago to which the reply was yes but the mail goes to lancing in england, we are in belfast and it hasnt been forwarded to us yet! The man said he can giv me no idea how long it will be before a decision is made and i'l just have to wait - My money gets stopped nxt week! The response to this was i'l extend the date by 3days! Like thats going to make any difference! Has anyone any ideas how to proceed if a letter comes back saying they dont believe me? I would happily let them search my house and they will c i'm not lying however i doubt someone will come all the way frm belfast to check up!!!!

hi i have read a few more comments on this as i replied yesterday.
i rang HMRC to check they were a ligitmate company and yes they are. wen i got through to concentrix i asked them to call me back, they will not make outside calls to ring you, thats why their 'systems' are always down so they speak to you as little as possible, in the meantime youre goin out of your head with worry!

try not to stress it, im glad i found this feed and im gonna write to the news people and This Morning too, they like to jump onto this sort of thing. we need to stick together on this one and bombard HMRC and Concentrix and news media to stop this happening to anyone else.

life is stressful enough having to rely on benefits just to get by in life without the threat of them stopping your money. some people suffer with depression and anxiety and this could quite easily tip them over the edge, its damaging and in todays society a terrorising us!

i was reported a couple of years ago as having my bf living with me, he does stay over but he doesnt contribute at all to my home, i proved this and i also asked them to tell me the rules of having someone staying in your home.THERE ARE NO RULES OR EVEN GUIDELINES stating how many nights a week they are allowed to even stay over. its all about the finances. my bf is living on sickness benefit of around £70 a week, how the hell can he give me money when that is only just paying his way? they even tried to say if he is giving me emotional support then that is the same. bull shit!

if your bf has his own place and pays for that place then there is no evidence of him living with you!

i can understand them having a problem if he didnt have his own place ya know?

Dont stress about it, stand your ground, question all the information they need and give as little as possible, record the calls or as ive said before email yourself a letter outling everything that was said, complain, complain, complain!!!

good luck to you all out there, you only need to right one letter and photocopy it!

would it help if none of us put stamps on any of this 'evidence' you send so they have to foot the postage, its gonna quite costly to send, especially when ur living on benefits, they have no right to presume ur guilty..and you dont have to prove ur innocence. xxx

hugs x

i like how Gingerbread are sitting on the fence with this one! Do as they say single parent slackers.. oh an btw all donations are welcome!

I received a letter asking about my hours of work. It asked for wage slips and a contract of employment. I was unsure if who concentrix were and phone HMRC to check it out. They confirmed concentrix are working on their behalf reviewing claims.

I was reluctant to send in any information as they wanted originals. SoI went and spoke to my solicitor who advised me to send in as much information as possible. This is what gingerbread have said too.

I sent my documents in and called to see if they were received, the guy on the phone was extremely helpful, explained who concentrix were and why they needed the information. He also said it was a routine check. The guy apologized for the inconvenience and couldn't have been nicer.

I was reluctant to send in the information as it asked for originals. However you people seem to not want to send in documentation for the sake of it. When you apply for tax credits(and you can see this on the application form and on HMRCs website) they have the right to investigate anyone receiving tax credits at any time. After all we do receive money from them for just doing our jobs. To me that's a gratitude and if they want to ask me for documents once a year to keep receiving my free money, I'm more than happy to oblige.

In the words of John Kimble, 'Stop whining' and send in the information.

My company I work for also has trouble differentiating flat numbers in a block with the same postcode and main number. This is because the block of flats shows as one number. Ex. 30 hargate road flat 2. This comes under 30 hargate road, as do the rest of the flats in that block.

Their system must be similar and pick up the same thing.

youwantsome, lots of agencies do things for citizens. It doesn't give them carte blanche to strip us of all privacy.

Laws state that investigators (including police) must act proportionally. For some types of data, they even need to make a case in front of a magistrate that the seriousness of crime and quality of evidence justify a warrant to invade privacy.

"There's a man living somewhere in your block of flats so send us all your bank statements and utility bills" does not constitute a proportional response. Even with the law tilted as far as it is in favour of snoopers.

youwantsome? you were asked about hours you worked and wanted wage slips and contract of employment, correct?

well we were accused of having 'evidence' that 'maybe' another adult was living with us? A contradictory accusastion that we were defrauding the government and if we didnt reply within an alloted time frame all our benefits would be stopped!

Incase you dont know, if a person is found guilty of defrauding the government that person could face criminal charges, have their money stopped, have to repay all monies recieved, pay penalties and possibly have a criminal record!

If you were faced with such a threat wouldn't that upset, worry or even panic the shit out of you?

now if they sent me a letter stating they needed up to date information, to make sure i was getting the right benefits, whch had to be sent in in a reasonable amount of time, i doubt there would have been this much panic going around!

so i'm glad you were spared such distress.

next time you decide to bang your keyboard remember what your mother said 'If you haven't got anything nice or constructive to say, then don't say anything at all'

Have yourself a nice day

xxx

Well exactly, issey.

Asking for evidence of work hours, for a benefit calculated from work hours: fine.
Accusing someone of criminal fraud and demanding they disprove this: not so much. And the personal data they're invading your privacy to demand doesn't even prove what they're trying to prove.

BTW, I don't get tax credits so none of this affects me personally.

But I'm not impressed at the shenanigans described in this thread. Sounds like HMRC are showering taxpayers' money on a bunch of cowboys who've just sent "Flee! All is discovered!" letters to thousands of honest taxpayers.

God knows what this shower will actually do with everyone's private data. They haven't exactly demonstrated professionalism so far, have they?

I agree with Itsgoingtoreindeer - it's not about being checked it's about being accused. Also if you are going to check people (many of whom are living stressful lives) it needs to be done appropriately and dealt with in a reasonable length of time. The thought of spending the next few months worrying if there's something wrong with my past claims (always tried to deal with them accurately) is one extra issue I could do without right now.

Letter from Concentrix. Phone hmrc, I have, I have contacted their director Lin Homer! Stand up to them! I've been single for 5 years! They have sent a standard letter out to thousands to scare us,we all got the same letter and their evidence is postal?!....... This is a lie! Please be brave ladies, stand up to them.email copies to ur mps, hmrc directors, I've even emailed the Sun Newspaper. We are innocent! We look after our babies and this is what we get?! Hell no ladies!!!! Don't be frightened of them! X

I can see that some of you are a bit about what youwantsome has posted, but our letter was requesting confirmation of working hours and asking for contracts, payslips etc as well. Not as bad as being accused of living with someone when you're single BUT the letter also went on to say that fraud is a crime and that payments would stop/monies recouped if it was found that we'd not been truthful about the hours worked so there was most certainly a suggestion of guilt until proven innnocent. It also enclosed the leaflet about benefit fraud. I felt sick when I first read it but knew we had been truthful about DH's working hours but it didn't stop me worrying for weeks that they would cut our WTC and CTCS.

I don't for one minute think our letter was random as DH changed his working pattern in November and lo and behold the letter arrived in early January - after HMRC issued him new tax codes etc and his first salary had been received.

Check the bottom right hand side of your letters, it says Director...Louise Boyle. She is nothing to do with concentrix, she is a director of hmrc. we phone hmrc they say concentrix is dealing with it and they can't comment, but concentrix director is chris caldwell, but he is no where on the letter. Yes....... true ...... There is fraud going down, but it ain't us!!!

You are absolutely right chrissyd83 - stand up to them! Remember Data Protection is there to protect YOU not for organisations to use to hide behind.
The ICO (Information Commissioners Office) are very helpful. You have rights and there are a number of this you can do.

1. Submit a Access Request to find out what information they are holding for you
2. Raise a Concern - There are a number of reasons you can list for this. They even provide a template letter.

There's a lot of good information on their site...and their helpline is even better. (Don't be put of by exemptions). Anything like this has to go to HMRC as the Data Controllers of the information and who are legally responsible. If one piece of information is leaked, lost, used for another purpose, etc, etc, - HMRC is liable.

My letter regarding my hours of work also said if I did not contact them by the fifth of January my tax credits could stop. Yet I didn't feel accused.

You guys are coming on here, registering an email address, giving details of your personal lives yet you are complaining about sending in information basically proving what you have just told everyone on here!

To say you were accused is wrong. From what I've seen in these comments, the letter states 'we have evidence' and uses the word 'may' be living with someone/a husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend. That says to me that you may be, not you are, therefore I do not see an accusation!

Some people even saying this is an invasion of my privacy. When you register for tax credits you fill out a form giving your address, phone number, earnings, employer, hours of work, who you live with, your date of birth, your kids etc. So they already have this information so if something on their system shows on the contrary to what you have told them, then of course they are gonna question it. If you paid a builder to do some work in your back garden and he said ok I'll do the work and tells you it's gonna cost 250 quid, then when he has done the work, he gives you a bill for 300 quid I'm damn sure you're gonna ask him what is going on you told me this but now your bill says this. It doesn't match up. So the government are giving you money for what you've told them. If you then change what you originally told them without informing them and they find something to show this you can be damn sure they are gonna ask you what's goin on.