Good evening..
Sorry if this is in the wrong place.. I'm new to this.. And please bare with me as I try to explain as I don't understand much of it myself..
So basically when I began recieving tax credits I was on maternity leave from work following having been off sick due to a problematic pregnancy. I'm assuming this is where the £5000 figure has come from (bare with me)..
Fast forward to this week.. About to complete tax credits renewal online and inform them that I have started recieving carers allowance this year. I noticed that while they have me listed as "0" jobs they did have an income of around £5000 (see above)
This worried me.. as I don't earn £5000 from any kind of job so I therefore phoned them today to quiery this. I was advised that this was an auto generated/estimated figure by tax credits?
I then proceeded to inform her that I recieve carers allowance for both my partner and son and she worked out this was an income of around £3000. (other benefits are disregarded). I pointed out that while i do recieve Carers allowance at a rate of £62 our ESA claim was reduced by £30 per week to accommodate this. Therefore is it not actually a figure of around £1500 not £3000 as I'm not actually £3000 a year better off.
She explained it doesn't work like this as they don't take ESA into account. I was therefore worried about a £3000 overpayment hitting me when she explained that as they had estimated £5000 earnings I actually had an underpahment not an overpayment.
Few queries with this.. I'm assuming this £5000 has been on my claim since I was on maternity leave but not taken off when I came out of work? Which was a good 3 years ago. Have I been getting underpaid due to this £5000 for the years I haven't been recieving it or have I been doing anything wrong for this time and do I need to mention it to them?
I logged onto manage my tax credits this evening and it says they have finished processing my renewal? Already, same day? I will recieve an award within 2 weeks but all payments are the same so should I expect them to stay the same? Seems very quick.
I will of course phone them in the morning to ask all of this but my kind is just doing overtime right now. Never filly understood tac credits :(
Thanks in advance for anyone that can offer any advice