Child benefit threshold

[Thingsthatgo]

My DH has just shown me his p60 for last year, and I noticed that his income was just over 50k (under 51k). His overtime varies a lot from year to year, but he’s never gone over 50k, and it hadn’t occurred to me that he would (stupidly). So, he is over the lower threshold for child benefit self assessment. He does pay a lot into pension and charity which is taken from his pay. If his pension payments take him under £50k, does he still have to fill in the form? How does he go about doing this? Can he apply online? (I said that I’d find out all this for him because he is incredibly busy at the moment, and I am not!)

There is an online checker you can use if you are around £50K. Basically, you take off all of your pension contributions and if it takes you under £50K it tells you that you have nothing to pay.

Yes he can apply for self assessment online.

www.gov.uk/child-benefit-tax-charge

www.gov.uk/child-benefit-tax-calculator

As another pp has said if the pension brings his salary under 50k then he doesn’t have to pay anything

That’s not entirely true about the pension contributions - it will depend if the pension is paid via salary sacrifice. If so, you may be liable to pay back partially.

If the taxable pay box on the p60 is over 50k you need to do self assessment and payback the percentage over. You'll only pay a tiny bit back at 51k.
I've just spent 6 hours trying to do the online self assessment which hasn't asked a single question about child benefit! But my tax situation is complicated.

Ok cool. Thanks all for your advice. His pension contributions take him well under £50k but his contribution isn’t on his p60. Is there a way of finding out his total contributions for the tax year? (The hr dept at work is Very slow).
He has applied for his UTR anyway.

The amount that HMRC is interested is “taxable pay” on the P60. This will be the amount after any salary sacrifice pension contributions have been taken off.

DH and I did his self assessment online a couple of days before Christmas. It honestly took about half an hour and a lot of that was going through statements for the year (2018/19) for gift aided charity donations. Those also reduce the amount of CB you pay back. DH has simple affairs though only income is his PAYE job, no benefits in kind or car, so he just needed his P60, and a list of his charitable donations. The CB amount is calculated for you when you enter how many children you claimed for. We’ve got to pay back about £900 for 2018/19 but I stopped claiming from April this year as earnings now well over £60k even with the deductions so next year he will complete self assess to claim back higher rate tax relief on charitable donations.

So I should have done a self assessment? Mine went slightly over last year as I was paid for passing a professional exam. This is going to be a pain in the arse as I can’t do my tax return online. 😫

What can’t you do it online? I thought it HAD to be done online now but willing to be corrected...

www.gov.uk/check-if-you-need-tax-return

This tool will tell you if you need to do one

Ah! Ok, so that taxable pay is after pension has been taken off? And charitable donations taken from his pay?
Ok cool. That makes it easier then. Thank you!

@BuggerOffAndGoodDayToYou - I can’t do mine online because I am “special”. Believe me, it is an utter pain in the arse.

There are multiple ways to pay into a pension. Salary sacrifice, whereby you agree to let your employer pay you less in return for them paying more into your pension, reduces your taxable pay. Additional voluntary contributions, where you pay more into your own pension, are sort of paid pre-tax, because you get the tax back, but strictly you still earned the money so it still counts as part of your salary for this purpose. So whether your DH earned over £50K depends on how his pension contribution worked...