When I go through the "do i qualify" section of Tax Credits helpline, it says I'm entitled to less than I receive

[NotAnotherTaxCreditQ]

but the sums are the same as the sums listed on my Tax Credits provisional notice, hours are the same etc

What's going on?!

are you paying back for an overclaim in previous years or are they paying you this year on what was earned & worked last year, you have to tell them if you want it based on your actual earnings this year.

The figure you are getting is what you would be entitled to between now and the end of the tax year NOT the whole tax year if that makes sense.

Yes I'm paying back an overclaim, bit by bit.

Say I'm entitled to £3000 wtc and £5000 ctc

That's what it says on my provisional notice

When I do it online on "do i qualify", it says £1500 wtc and £4000 ctc (for example) so they don't even KNOW there's an overclaim involved

Does that make sense?

The figure you are getting on the calculator I mean tells you the total you are entitled to between NOW and APRIL.

Yes, Ineedacleaner, I did have an initial panic about that - I've worked out there are (roughly) 18 weeks left of this financial year, so have divided figures given by 18 and then multiplied by 52, to give me a year's total

Am I doing something wrong?

gah I've stumped you all. I'm very worried that come April they'll say "whoops! We overpaid you, we'll give you sod all this year now"

it can depend on your income. your award is initially based on the previous year's income then you have an allowance for a change in income. So if last year you had say £10k but this year, you've got £13k, the award will still be based on £10k and will change to £13k in April. Online estimate will use this year's income though and not take into account that allowance. If that makes sense?!

I have made a major mistake with tax credits. When we had ds 5 years ago I was going to claim and so many people advised me against it, said that we would only get about £10 per month and their payments had all been messed up and they were in thousands of pounds worth of debt with the tax office. So we didn't claim, at the time I was still receiving maternity pay so it wasn't urgent. Fast forward 2 years, all our savings had been used up we were really struggling to make ends meet so I also went online to see what we would be entitled to and it said nothing, like a fool I just accepted this. The other day on a thread someone mentioned that the upper limit for tax credits is £58k, dh earns much less than this so it would appear that we have been missing out.

Does anyone have any idea if they take your monthly bring home pay into account? Dh's contractual salary is about £8k more than he actually receives because they add the value of his company car and pension on top.

it is the total gross income and includes any benefits in kind. That means that it would be your DH's salary before tax and would include the value of company car.

If your income is between about £30k and £58k(ish) then you would get the family element which is about £550 per year.