V confused about what to do about Child Benefit / Council tax now?

[DoinItForTheKids]

Hi

My home situation is divorced, got DD 16 in further education and DS 19 just gone away to uni this year. Just 4 weeks ago I started a new job and due to sheet determination and a dogged determination from a short, wrinkled woman covered in HRT patches in her fifties, have finally gotten onto a salary of £60k (!).

They reduced my child benefit as is correct, when DS went off to uni but now I'm into the higher earnings thing for child benefit aren't I. I know that means a choice between being taxed on it or better just to knock it on the head.

Then there's council tax. I sent a reply back last week which they should have had by now confirming I live there, DD lives there and DS is at uni. Included his offer letter so they can see he's there. Do I still qualify for the 10% discount or not?? I can't seem to make head nor tail of the rules. Also, when I go to the gov.uk CB calculator I think well, I can't really complete it because I don't know what my total is going to be for this year - I've not worked a full year yet at this new salary - do I just take the known income for last year from May '18 thru end Sept '18 and then tot up the new salary earnings running from October '18 through April '19 and if it comes to £60k I need to call CB, if it's less, I don't?

I've only had the benefit of this much increased salary for 4 weeks and the demands on it are so many.... this is in part due to the fact that 'D'XH hasn't paid any child maintenance since June and it's literally wiped me out. God knows how he's not had his house repossessed yet because mine would have been if I'd been out of work for far less than six months! Someone in his or his missus's family (or both) is supporting him oh, and yes, really, so am I effectively because he's not giving any money to pay for his two children and I've supported myself by bleeding my meagre savings dry. Weirdly, I feel more stressed at the moment than I have for a while! The upshot of this information really is that whilst things look good in theory I'm not actually in a particularly stable financial state at the moment even with the new salary and I still need to really carefully manage all my costs and expenditure.

Do I still qualify for the 10% discount or not

Is this for council tax and single adults? If so, it is 25% not 10% and I would have thought that if your DS is a student, then yes you do - but look on your local council website, because the information should be there.

As far as CB is concerned, the advice to claim it and pay it back via the tax system is aimed at those who are SAHP/low earners because they are caring for children under 12, to make sure they get the NI credits for their pension, but this wouldn't apply to you because you aren't caring for a child under 12.

However, if you are earning exactly £60k and paying into a pension, this money is taken off your salary before reducing your CB, so you might be entitled to some, not all of it, but I think you will need to do a tax return to sort it all out. Probably best looking on the HMRC website as it's all explained clearly there.

Are you going to be earning over £50k this financial year though? As we are half way through, unless your income in the first half was near to this it will probably average out. Plus it is only pay after pension has been deducted so you might be under the limits for this year anyway.

Even if you are over then you can still claim child benefit and complete a tax return for the financial year 18/19 which needs to be submitted by January 2020. That should kick any tax repayments comfortably into the future as long as your circumstances don't change.