Working family tax credit

[Panicky]

Eeeek! Help!!

Have just had to post off old bank statements, and childcare receipts to WFTC offfice as they have requested them for a 'spot check'.

The problem is when I have looked properly at my childcare receipts I think I miscalculated and have told them I paid more childcare than I actually did last financial year!! Don't know how I did it and feel an absolute numpty now I have re-calculated, don't know where I got the original figures from.

Obviously I will pay back anything I have been overpaid but I am really panicking now that I will be fined or something!! Does anyone know anything about this??

You won't be fined. They just take it off next year's. Are you sure you got it wrong first time round? Could you have lost some of the receipts, or not taken into account some childcare expenses?

Yes, thought I would be clever and devised a spreadsheet to calculate weekly average (have to pay before/after school club and another club in holidays), but I have definitely got it wrong somehow. Obviously am not as good at excel as I thought!! Think I have got an average using term-time weeks (39) instead of 52 weeks.

Feel such an ejit now though, and feel sick at the thought of being done or fined by the Inland Revenue.

Is is classed as fraudulent if I have admitted that I miscalculated and I will pay it back?

Sorry I am just papping my pants now as IR carry so much weight!!

Don't worry - they are very heavy with self-employed people and with income tax forms, but they are not so heavy about this sort of stuff and are themselves feeling their way - they are being asked to do the work of the Benefits Agency with tax credits, and it's a totally new ball game for them too. After the initial f**k ups they made in the first year, I doubt if they want more bad publicity by using IR heavy handed tactics on benefit-related issues. If you explain that that is where the mistake was made, it's perfectly comprehensible to them. But do try and find out exactly why you thought it was more, in case you were right first time round!

If they do try and fine you, see your MP. The way the tax credits are administered is being kept an eye on.

Thanks MeanBean!

Feeling a little less panicky now!

Don't worry. We underdeclared savings the first year we claimed and I was cacking myself too tbh (it was a completely genuine error, we had too much by about 100 quid or something silly) but it was fine. They calculated how much we'd been overpaid, we paid it, end of story. They don't seem to be like the IR (I know they are though), the were reasonable and professional with us. I thought I'd be hauled to court to branded a fraud too but no. Send them the spreadsheet I would and let them work out you made a mistake - at least they'll be able to see how you made it.

Oh gosh, I never got anywhere near as accurate with them. I just called them up and told them that I had underestimated my income and had actually earned a few thousand more than expected. And then gave them the new projected estimate for upcoming year. They said ok, don't worry, we'll work it out and soon sent me a new award for upcoming year that had money that I'd been overpaid for last year taken out.
I really wouldn't worry about it.

I think a lot of people got the figures wrong last year-it was a completely new system and no-one knew what was going on, including the IR!As everyone has said, they just work out what you should have paid and take it off this years payments. If this causes you hardship, they will spread the repayments over several years if you ask them to.So dont worry about it-you are in the same boat as thousands of others!