This has probably been done to death on other threads but just in case it saves anyone else losing money!!:
Now that class 2 national insurance is taken annually, it’s quite likely that when you apply for mat allowance they will classify you as ‘not having paid enough to qualify’ leaving you with an award of only £27/week.
I applied as early as they allowed me to, paid the required £37.05 the day I had my letter through advising me I would only be getting £27/wk, am yet to receive any official letters from hmrc with a bill.
Spoke to hmrc today and they have no record of my payment. It will take 10 working days to do an ‘urgent trace’. I couldn’t pay again over the phone. They can’t guarantee the same problem won’t happen again if I simply pay again online.
Once they find my payment they then have to inform the DWP, who will review my award. This can take up to 21 working days.
My mat leave payments start today. They wont backdate the payments or add more time onto the period I can receive mat allowance.
Basically I will be losing out on £100s I should have been entitled to.
I would strongly advise anyone self-employed planning to claim mat allowance to contact HMRC ASAP and pay £37.05 class 2 national insurance (the maximum you will have to pay) to make sure your application goes through first time and you avoid all the delay! Also be sure to check the code HMRC give you to identify your payment applies to this tax year (apparently another common mistake).
Hope this helps someone!