Help needed! Just found out about tax charge on child benefit.

[Banoffeepie29]

Hope this is OK to post. I've been such an idiot! I had some good advice on here recently about taking control more of my finances in an unequal marriage. I created a HMRC account on the app and realised I was only claiming child benefit for 2 children when I have 3! As I've recently learnt it's important for your pension credits to claim, I started a new claim for 3rd child but then read about the high income tax charge! I'm not 100% hiw much he earns, but I'm pretty sure my H earns atleast 60k. Now I am worried I will get in trouble for claiming. I'm not sure when he passed the 60k threshold, or exactly how much he is on.

Does anybody know if I will have to pay the tax charge back now? Does it get back dated? Or will it be H who has to pay it, he will be fuming if that's the case! I feel so stupid because I had no idea about this rule I'm rubbish at things like this anyway. I've got to the part of the claim where I need his NI number but now I'm worried about telling him. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I worry about you too OP, and his control, going by this thread and your previous one. He is hiding everything from you x

Thanks for all the practical replies. I think what I will have to do is ask him what he earns after his pension is deducted, and if its above 60k, I will ask if he does tax returns. To those who are concerned, thank you, H isn't physically violent or anything like that, but he does get uptight and anxious about finances. He also can get tetchy when I mention money, eg, when I asked a while ago if he didn't trust me because he wont have me on the deeds of the house, he shouted at me and bright red with anger and stormed out. I did have a thread on here recently but I had asked to have it taken down due to possibly being identifying.

I just know he will be really worried about paying this money back and sometimes that makes him angry or in a bad mood, which is why I'm worried to tell him. Does anybody know if he will have to pay it all together or in installments? I'm really stupid at stuff like this.

Any tax year my partner has earned over the child benefit threshold the HMRC have written to him and asked him to do a self assessment to work out how much of the child benefit we have to pay back. He was in the £40-50k bracket (after pension) when it was the old threshold, we had a couple of years getting the full amount but now he is now on £60k after pension deductions
They have now changed the system if the only reason you will need to do the self assessment is the repayment of child benefit. His tax code gets adjusted based on his expected income and how much of the child benefit needs to be repaid. Nice in principle but so far this year he has had to go onto the gov gateway to correct his expected income as a calculation somewhere has gone awry and his tax code has gone massively off - he gets letters when he tax code has changed.

The best way to know if any needs to be paid back is to talk to him about his salary and pension contributions and whether he is over the threshold and knows about the thresholds. My partner pays 10% into his pension at the moment so it's only now his salary is in the high 60s that we need to start paying it back.

We got an option, we but we repaid in full

As an aside, your fear of his moods and asking these questions would have me having different conversation with you. Its not fair on you to be having to avoid having important conversations because of his anxieties and worries. Even if not abusive (hard to tell from what is said here but if you were a friend I'd been exploring this more with you) it's no way to treat someone who should be your life partner. He needs to work on his actions and feelings not you moderating your actions and feelings to avoid his outbursts etc.

@Superscientist That's a relief that you had the option, thank you.

He’s financially abusive, you have a family and you don’t share a bank account!?

This isn't right, it's if one of you earns 60k-80k then you pay some of it back, over 80k you pay all of it back. It's still important to claim it and pay it back though if your not working for state pension purposes

Depending on how long he has been over £50k there may be many years of child benefit to pay back. It has only recently gone up to £60-80k. I don’t know if there are fines for late payments, but the sooner you tell him the better.

Oh no 😒. That's made my heart sink.

No we never have. This was explained in my last thread.

Op, you are being financially abused and you are raising your children in a toxic atmosphere with an angry man. You need to talk about your actual problem so that we can help you, for your children’s sake.

How is it your fault when you don’t even know how much he earns?
If he doesn’t tell you how much he earns how can you tell him that he earns too much for child benefit purposes.

It's really important that you claim the child benefit, op.

Your income alone won't be enough to get you a pension in future. You need the NI credits that come with child benefit.

It's his problem if he hasn't filled in forms correctly. Chances are he has, and you're worrying about this unnecessarily.

At some point you will need to address any abuse issues, but I see you're not there yet. X

This is twaddle.

Have you not seen the edit also my other post where I said I have not claimed it for 14 years so it’s out of date 🙄

At least 3 posters on this thread giving completely wrong information. Why do people do this? Its not helpful to the op, all it does is cause confusion. If you dont know the accurate, up to date information dont post.

this might be useful.

Seems like a lot of money is going to have to be paid back, and we really don't need this right now..I'm dreading telling him, just can't do it tonight. Will try and pluck up courage in the morning.

Please don't think that this is all your fault. Presumably he is the children's father and, as a higher earner, it's HIS responsibility to deal with declaring CB claims, especially as he keeps you in the dark about his own financial position.

It's right that you should claim it, as it brings benefits for you in the long run as well as much needed cash. If he isn't sharing his wealth with you it's only right that he should have to do it via taxation instead. Please DO NOT stop your own CB claim.

I put your OP into Gemini Pro OP, and this is the response I got:

Take a breath—you are not an idiot, you will not get in trouble, and this is completely fixable. Thousands of parents get caught out by this every year because HMRC makes the system confusing.

1. Who Pays the High Income Child Benefit Charge (HICBC)? The tax charge is always the legal responsibility of the higher earner, regardless of who makes the claim or receives the cash.
Sidekick Accounting

• If your husband earns over the threshold, he is the person legally liable to pay the tax back to HMRC, not you.
• However, if he is kept in the dark and suddenly hit with a tax bill, he will naturally be upset—so this is something that needs resolving openly.

2. Understanding the Thresholds Check when his earnings rose, because the rules changed significantly:

• From 6 April 2024 onwards: The threshold started at £60,000 (raised from £50,000). The benefit is tapered between £60,000 and £80,000 (1% charge for every £200 earned over £60k). If he earns £65,000, you keep 75% of the money. The benefit is only wiped out completely once his income reaches £80,000.
• Low Incomes Tax Reform Group+ 3
• Pre-April 2024: The threshold was £50,000, with full clawback at £60,000.
• Commons Library - UK Parliament
• "Adjusted Net Income" matters: It is based on his taxable income after pension contributions and Gift Aid. If he earns £65k but pays £6k into a workplace pension, his adjusted net income is £59k, meaning zero tax charge.
• Turn2us

3. Does HMRC Backdate It?

• Child Benefit itself: When you submit a claim, HMRC will only backdate payments by a maximum of 3 months.
• The Tax Charge: If you have already been receiving Child Benefit for your first two children while he was earning over the threshold in previous tax years, HMRC can technically ask him to pay the historical charge. However, he may have already been dealing with this on his Self Assessment or PAYE without discussing it, or his pension contributions may have kept him under the radar.

4. How to Claim Without Getting the Cash (Protecting Your Pension) You were 100% right that claiming protects your State Pension. Each year you claim for a child under 12, you receive National Insurance Class 3 credits. If you do not want to deal with repayments or financial arguments:

• On the Child Benefit form (online or paper), there is a specific question asking: "Do you want to receive Child Benefit payments?"
• You can tick "No".
• Selecting "No" means no money is paid out, which means zero tax charge for your husband, but you still get the National Insurance pension credits awarded to your name.

How to Talk to Him Framing this conversation around retirement security makes it much easier: "I was reviewing my National Insurance record for my state pension and realized that because our third child wasn't registered on the Child Benefit system, I've been missing out on stay-at-home pension credits. To register them, HMRC asks for both parents' National Insurance numbers. We can either choose to receive the payments and adjust through your tax code/pension, or simply opt out of the cash payments so there is no tax impact on you at all while keeping my pension intact." If he earns between £60k and £80k, you are financially better off taking the payments even after the charge. But if keeping the peace in an unequal marriage is the priority right now, opting out of the payments lets you protect your future pension without risking an unexpected tax bill.

This is what happened to me, I just paid it back through a tax code adjustment , but I've also had to correct them several times

@Orangeyoucan thank you, that is very helpful x

There doesn't need to be violence for there to be domestic abuse. You are scared of his reaction, his anger, his moods, and he is keeping his higher salary separate whilst letting you struggle financially.

Psychological, emotional, financial and economic abuse are all legally recognised as forms of domestic abuse.

Please, please OP read this https://womensaid.org.uk/information-support/the-survivors-handbook/im-not-sure-if-my-relationship-is-healthy/

You deserve so much better than this.

Depending on how he makes his pension contributions he may be okay as it is done on your taxable income. For example if he earns 65k but pays 6k into pension then his taxable pay is 59k so he is below threshold.

From memory there is something about taxable pay and pension contributions on the tax return, so it will be included in the calculations on what if anything he owes for child benefit.

You will only be able to pay it back through the tax code for this year if he gets the self assessment tax return in by December 2026, then they will be able to put any tax owed through his 27/28 tax code. He can then call HMRC and ask for child benefit to be coded out going forward, and then he will still have to do a tax return but will hopefully not owe any extra by the time Jan rolls around! With 2 kids and earning nearer £60k I wouldn't necessarily worry about him owing a ton of money, although it's worth finding out his earnings and asking gov.uk to calculate it for you to be sure of the amount. If it is too high for you to pay you can call HMRC and set up a payment plan.