It's that time of year again! Aaaaagggghhhh!

[TheGoodEarth]

Out of interest what is the maximun WT credit?

[citizentwiglet]

Haven't a scoobie, I'm afraid.

[Milims]

Ruth - I know exactly what you mean about the DLA form - it is really off putting, but don't give up. I was told by someone who works for the benefit agency, who had to fill in the form herself, that she sought advice to do so (just goes to show that it's so complicated that even the staff can't do it!) She was told that the form had to be filled in as if every day was the very worst day. The trouble is, for those of us who are honest, that is a really difficult thing to do!
I just tried again to renew my tax credits and have come to the conclusion that HMRC either deliberately employ the most obstructive, unhelpful, objectionable people or the specifically train them to be that way! I received details of income from the 3 jobs that I have done in the last tax year - from HMRC - and range the Tax credit people to give them the figures and he point blank refused to add them together! Surely their computer system is designed so that if you input another figure it automatically recalculates! So having added the figures he asked me if that would be the same amount of earnings next year! Er no - I don't work at these places any more! The who experience leaves me totally stressed!

[Millymollymandy]

I've no idea what a tax credit is but I thought France was bad for red tape.

[TheGoodEarth]

I received details of income from the 3 jobs that I have done in the last tax year - from HMRC - and range the Tax credit people to give them the figures and he point blank refused to add them together!

Am I missing something here? If you are still trying to work out what you earned last year then send me the figures and I will add them together for you.

[Milims]

The point I was trying to make was that each time I change a job I inform them of what I've earned, so that they can add it onto the previous figure - I'd have thought that their system would do it automatically - after all even I can set us a simple spreadsheet to do that! The other point is that they were asking for a correct figure of the total earnings, so by giving them the individual figures they could compare and confirm with those previously given - after all, as they keep telling me, this is a legal document and the declaration has to be correct!

[grahamhobbs]

The crazy thing is that some people can manage to defraud millions out of tax rebates. Wasn't it a group of Poles who have just got caught for making £4 or £5million from fictious claims for tax rebates. As someone said, all you have to do is to give them the answers they want to hear.

[Milims]

Every time you contact them you have to give them the same information as you already gave them last time - it seems to me that they simply don't retain any of the information previously given and add the new information to it - it's no damn wonder that they make mistakes. You could tell them anything and they don't seem to have anything recorded to check it against. Add to that that there is no link between the HMRC tax credit department and the HMRC income tax department, so they seem to be entirely reliant and what an applicant tells them without checking it against their own records! We have previously had an incident where, despite us telling them of every simgle change of income they weren't recording it correctly and made an over payment of over £1000. We ended up with someone from HMRC, complete with their own records, coming to see us. When he arrived here he looked at the records and stated that it was clear that they had been furnished with the information but had not acted on it correctly!

[mrsflibble]

i have a similar easy renewal as CT; jim earns x a year, it doesn't change much and my last renewal told me i only needed to ring them if he starts earning over £50k or I get a job which brings the household income to over £50k! that soooo is not gonna happen!

i was told to try and claim DLA by my psych nurse at the start of last year because of the agoraphobia and other such nasties. 4 months of form filling in, hmrc losing my forms, appointments etc, letters from therapists and finally they send me a letter saying I couldn't have it. what was the point? all it did was make me MORE depressed and it made me go from a mild mannered mental case to a nutty nutty nutjob who wanted to throttle her nurse for suggesting it in the first place!!