Tax credits overpayment

[Areyoufree]

Another tax credits overpayment thread - sorry!

My husband and I both started new jobs last year. We notified the tax credits office of the change in our circumstances, and our payments stopped. All good. However, we have just received our yearly summary, and it says there is a 'yet to be confirmed' overpayment of £1600. No mention of whether or not we will have to pay it back. Am not sure what to do - my husband has phoned them before, and says it is an absolute nightmare, so thinks we should just ignore it. I am worried that we might miss some deadline for appeal, and think we should phone them and ask what's going on. Does anyone know what this letter means, and whether it's best to get in touch with them, or to wait and see what happens next?

Sometimes even though you have notified them of an increase in income , if you have already been paid tax credits for part of the tax year you will end up with an overpayment. You will need to pay it back. They will most likely adjust your award for the coming year.

Have you done your end of year reewal? Once they have your final earnings for 2016-2017 tax year they will finalize the overpayment and send you a letter detailing how they go about reclaiming the money. Are you still receiving payments at the moment?

We have just received our end of year review, but nothing has been finalised yet. Not currently receiving payments. I guess I had better give them a call as the review hasn't taken childcare into account. Was hoping to avoid having to contact them, as it is such a nightmare!

Once finalised they will inform you of an overpayment and advise how it should be paid back. Do you think you are likely to still get tax credits anymore? If not then you will need to arrange a repayment schedule. if you think you will still get some tax credits this year then they may reduce your payments to clawa back the overpayment.

The problem is because tax credits are calculated over the whole year, if you start earning above the threshold part way through the year you will have been overpaid even for the period before you started working, so will have to pay it back. that's just the way it work unfortunately.