where to start?
here's one - i really think there needs to be a legislative change around the rigidity of the requirement to claim as a single claimant or joint claimant - see earlier threads. there are no offset provisions, and a retrospective inland revenue decision that a person was a member of a couple when they claimed as a single person has the effect of nullifying their entitlement in the period of the claim. this can result in a very large overpayment decision, especially if there were childcare costs. These overpayments may be technical ie created through the decision and the framing of the legislation, and not necessarily by reference to a LOSS FROM PUBLIC FUNDS. eg if a single person had instead made a joint claim with her unemployed ex-partner (who the Inland Revenue now determines on flimsy and circumstancial evidence was living with her), she would still have been entitled to TC. She has not received more money than she would have done if she had claimed as a joint claimant.
it's worth noting that L/T of itself is not a bar to income support entitlement. the bar to entitlement is that a member of the couple is working over 16 hours, or has income exceeding the app. amount, etc. it is L/T + something else, which removes entitlement.
the 'offence' in the context of this legislation is merely claiming on what is judged the wrong basis, and the creation of a £12,000 or so overpayment when there has been no overall loss to public funds amounts to a hugely heavy fine. it's a heavy penalty for not filling in a form correctly! unjust and disproportionate are just two words which spring to mind. particularly when you consider the purpose of this 'benefit', with the fact that there is no right of appeal against overpayment decisions, and the inland revenue's practice on overpayment recovery, despite its stated policy.
entitlement decisions may be disputed - small comfort against seriously unfair legislation - there's many a slip, as they say, and even when the inland revenue's decision is ridiculous and weak, an appellant may already have been severely intimidated by the shock of receiving a huge bill from such a scary organisation, and then months of stress going over the rights and wrongs of it with first the inland revenue and then an adviser, maybe. i'm not surprised that another poster's disabled client didn't want to claim his legal entitlement again.
it's not just retrospective LT decisions that are a problem. relationships get into difficulty, people walk out, go back, go through periods of not knowing where they stand or where they're going. is it right that period need to give the inland revenue a blow by blow account ( maybe i should re-phrase that? ) of their relationship problems if they want to ensure they don't fall foul of the IR?
|