thanks guys - i had a lot of trouble with this - client came to us at a late stage, and i spent much of my weekend pulling together my patented chewing gum and string court defence - i was quite pleased with it in the end, with printed extracts of the treasury committee report etc...: ) saw client on Monday, whereupon she decided she couldn't face the stress of fighting it... this involving an adjournment request...that'll teach me...: ) gotta love'em...she seemed very depressed...
i got into a muddle with the years - hadn't spotted when i made both posts, that the (Revenue's) claim was for 05/06, and the statement of liabilities was for the same 1200 + quid, but said it was 2004/05 - this was issued in Jan 07, which led me astray until i realized the SoL date was an error - so it was a current year o/p. sorry about that - my first post was right... : (
basic scenario was this - iraqi client, speaks only a little English, can't read or write English at all, one child, started work 16 hours in March 2005 - went to LA neighbourhood office to report change - they notified jobcentre for her and IS stopped - she believed they also notified HMRC - but they evidently didn't - otherwise she would have been asked for earnings information and, as she is low paid, would have qualified for WTC - she does not know anything about WTC. next, in October 05 she received a letter from HMRC - they are stopping her CTC because she didn't return annual declaration. it tells her what to do if she thinks she is still entitled to CTC, but doesn't ask her to do anything. on the reverse, some award info including TC overpayment -"we will write to you separately about it". also sent a final award notice for 2005/05 - entitlement same as amount actually paid so no problem with that. she gets a friend to translate it, and since she had not receieved the annual dec - got friend to write a letter to that effect - could not face telephoning with her broken English.
stopping of payments almost coincided with child leaving FTE - assumed HMRC know since they pay ChB which stopped in September - believed this was the reason payments stopped, not understanding the meaning of the letter about annual declaration, so she did not seek reinstatement of payments.
heard nothing in response to her letter of October 2005 until Dec 2006 - demand from Cumbernauld... was confused and phoned, then wrote for clarification - county court proceedings started late January 2007, and nil award notice issued for April - Oct 2005.
She has lost out on entitlement to WTC from March 2005 to date, and has to repay 6 months CTC, when entitlement -wise, she was only overpaid 2 months CTC...
this is not a system which is fit for its purpose...and the treasury is profitting from complexities HMRC has built into the system - the most vulnerable and least able are hit the hardest by the penalties for failure to navigate the claim complexities - tackling child poverty and social injustice? somebody's havin' a larf...but we all know this...
this afternoon saw another client - also doesn't speak English - had spotted reference in July 07 award notice to an overpayment which is being recovered - had not spotted it on earlier notifications - it's £4,000 +. i phoned helpline...
o/p is from 2003/04 - it's a duplicate payment case - o/p occurred on 15/7/04 when the computer paid 03/04 entitlement and arrears in a lump sum, and manual payments had been made throughout previous year. they notified her on 12/7/04 that she had been overpaid, and they would start to recover the overpayment through (a surprisingly small) deduction from ongoing entitlement. yes- they notified her of the overpayment and recovery arrangements 3 days before they actually overpaid her... i had a very,,,erm,,strange conversation on that point, with the nice lady who genuinely couldn't see what is obvious to anybody outside of HMRC world...worrying...
none of the info i relayed to client rang a bell with her - admittedly she has had a very stressfull few years - eldest son was on a life support machine for two weeks in 04 following a serious RTA involving a couple of buses, and then her youngest boy developed leukemia...i've sent her off to get bank statements so that we can check HMRC's version...have warned her little chance of write off, which she is ok with, but first we want to check that she actually received duplicate payments - point really being about stealth overpayment notices, and the significant differential in perceptions of reality between HMRC and regular folks...
am thinking that HMRC can afford to be cavalier with their their demands for dosh, having had major imput in drafting of legislation, successfully and calculatedly excluded overpayment appeal rights and external checks and balances, have carte blanche near as dammit on interpretation of the law (section 18 (11)- do what!) and retaining historic and customary above the law tax collecting powers, with outstanding obfuscation skills.
and now the ministry vets have come for Shambo!! : ( : (
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