Tax Credits - surely this is too much?

[bestservedcold]

This week DP and I have had about £800 deposited in our seperate bank accounts from WTC and CTC. Then this morning I received a bill from them to repay an overpayment of £700 odd. So I rang them to find out what was going on.

The overpayment of £700 approx is from my Apr 2008/9 claim and was due to me stopping receiving DLA and CA for DS and not telling them for months. Fair enough, I was expecting that.

The £800 that has gone in this week is backdated money from a new claim, started on 5 September this year, when DP and I moved in together. DP will continue to get £89 WTC and I'll get £55 CTC

When I told Tax Credits that DP had moved in and that I was coming off Income Support, they gave me a forecast of £20 WTC based on our new family income. I thought that sounded about right. DP earns £22k before tax and works 40 hours a week and I'm a SAHM btw.

The guy I spoke to assured me this is correct and quoted DP's salary and contracted hours, but he was abrupt and more interested in how I was going to repay the £60 a month overpayment. (It won't be a problem if we're going to be receiving an extra £140 a week from them so I was more interested in sorting that out).

To confuse me even more, we haven't received the paperwork so can't check for ourselves. The guy told me that our paperwork was returned to them by Royal Mail, which is odd as DP is a postman.

We now have about £500 a week net income which is bloody fantastic, but it can't be right, can it?

(Name changed for obvious reasons)

i don't know sorry, could you ask citizens advice bureau?

how many dc do you have?

Just 1. 7 year old DS

MMH, I'm really, really, really hoping that a MN will say that it's right (unlikely as it seems to me) and then I will just leave it. Otherwise I'll call TC back and ask to go through it again.

Ok we get a lot of tax credits but I have 6 DC.
I would check entitledto it is a really easy site to use and is usually a good estimate of what you should get.

Also when dealing with TC send everything signed for and keep a record of it.

HTH.

I have just had a look on entitled to and used your info and it says you should be entitled to
£86.87 WTC a week
£53.41 CTC a week.

Thanks Cometrick. How did you get that forecast from EntitledTo?

I wish it was right, but sadly not. I've just called them to re-check it and there is an error. On the form it asked about benefits and I ticked the box for income support (because technically I was still receiving it on that date) and wrote a note next to it with the date it was going to be cancelled. The form was read by a computer so my note wasn't seen and they have disregarded DP's earnings in their calculations.

Gutted, gutted gutted!

Don't know how much we'll be getting now but probably £20 a week as of the forecast.

Rather know now than end up owing thousands by next year though.

Sorry bestservedcold, but you are overpaid as you've now found out. However in some instances, if they've overpaid you and it's their fault, they let you keep it. Worth asking!

My dp works and I don't after having lost my job in Aug. We have 2 dc's and get around £400 WC and CTC per month - not per week.

Sorry bsc I just put in some rough details you posted in your OP .

I doubt if they'll let me keep what they've sent so far. They'll probably just take it off our correct entitlement leaving us with, ooohh, just about nothing!

What is it they say? If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

Ah, that's ok Cometrick. I knew it couldn't be right anyway

Oh forgot to mention. I've also just learned that I was overpaid by £750 between Apr and Sept this year (God knows how) and to expect to start paying that back this time next year. That's on top of the £60 a month that I'm paying back from 1 Nov.

This has turned out to be totally shit.

Talk about find a penny and lose a pound.

Well they overpaid us once, although that was slightly different, the woman over the phone and her supervisor told us we were entitled to those amounts, so when they discovered we weren't and tried to get it back, I argued the toss, saying we did double check and it was basically their mistake. They must have taped the call because we got a letter back admitting it was their fault and outlining how much their mistake had cost them.

So if you were told you were entitled to that, then fight for it!

I'll wait 'til I get the paperwork through and see how they propose to recover the money. I think I've probably blown it by calling twice within a few hours, and I'm sure they'll argue that any reasonable person wouldn't spend £800 that just appeared in their account within a few days.

What pisses me off is that they use a fucking computer to read the claim forms. I mean, I knew they did, but really thought that if there were additional writing on the form the computer would reject it and a human would have to look at it.

I'm pissed off with myself too. That £60 that I'm paying back now is due to my own inaction earlier this year. I knew I had to let them know that DS wasn't getting DLA anymore and that it would affect my entitlement but I left it for a few weeks because I was skint. Then I got scared that I was going to get in trouble and the weeks turned into months. With no TC coming in at all now I'm going to really struggle to find that money. I can't blame TC for that, it was me burying my head in the sand.

I don't know how they've worked out that they've overpaid me again though. That just takes the piss! We'll be paying them back for the next 2 years. I'm definitely going to dispute that one!

I did the sums before DP moved in. We knew how much we'd have to live on and we can manage. Things are a bit tighter now but still managable. I had mentally spent that money from TC though, on a holiday and a newer car and a great Christmas - yes, I'm mostly very pissed off with myself.