child tax credit overpayment

[teir12011]

Tax credit office seems to be pretty rubbish, I applied for tax credits in the beginning of August. When I phone they repeat the same slogan saying they are doing further checks.
I don't know what to do???

[mohmmad786]

Hello again, I have just received a letter from tax credit. It seems like they have totally disregarded the letter we sent them I am posting the copy of the letter so you can read it as well.



I would appreciate if you could tell me what action should i take now should i call them or should it be something else? The main problem is that the case is under my Mrs name and everytime we call tax credit, they want to speak to her and she really dont want to speak to them specially because of her mental condition and the way she is feeling right now.
Again thanks alot for the help.

[mohmmad786]

Reading along the lines they have totally disregarded the last letter we sent them in september. It was Amber who helped us with the letter(Thankyou very much). I was trying to find the receipt of the letter but unfortunately i couldnt find one but it is funny how tax credit stopped sending letters after that time and now they totally disregard that letter and ask for the money.

[Amber]

You need to get the CAB to write to them on your behalf.

[mohmmad786]

Sorry to bring this old thread back. In short the tax credit have declined everything. I have approached the mp before but they said that they never advised my wife to claim as a single. I approached CAB last year in september, the person dealing with the case said that as we have got no proof, the only thing we can try and ask is for the debt to be written off on the grounds of hardship. They still havent replied to cab.

In the mean time i applied for subject access request, the CD for the phone calls didnt work so i have applied for another subject access request asking for more papers and a working cd as the old request was around 4 months back. I have asked for all the paper communication as last time i only asked for the things on there computer and the calls.

I received a letter from tax credits yesterday saying that they will start deducting £25 from the money we receive. The good thing is that i would not get any letters from debt collection agencies.

Now comes the difficult part, I checked the dates of the call on SAR and on the letter tax credit replied to the MP, they don't match. I have also gone through all the paperwork they sent me and found some screenshots which i feel are very important. I would try and write them in date order.

AP1 = My Wife
AP2 = Me

03/05/2007 MR M N***M = REJECTED

22/06/2007 MR M N***M = REJECTED

20/07/2007 AT ap1 called not happy as award ended due to ap1 advising had a partner ap1 put in another claim with full details but advised me ap2 is not entitled to public funds i advised ap1 who stated she already advised previous advice yet still............

25/07/2007 AT-advised applicant until ap2 gets his nino claim wont get put through-advised to contact person who is dealing with nino allocation-and let us know-advised as per guidance - If the customer is part of a couple they should make a joint claim.

27/07/2007 AT-TL call back re application. Explained until NINO allocated or Ap2 visa issued joint claim would not go through. AP2 may leave the country and AP1 could then put in single claim. TJ

07/08/2007 at - advised app on backdating and that once application is processed will establish then if needs to be backdated further as last payment made on single claim was in June, 2007.


The most important part is 27/07/2007 where you can read that its tax credit who are advising and not my wife telling them on the system. I have tried looking for the old rules for tax credits which would have applied to us in 2007 but could not find them and what i found went over my head as i could not understand it. If anyone could help me with the rules and guide PLEASE. Tax credit has also denied that they have not told my wife to claim as a single person while we are living together but the screenshot of 27/07/2007 is saying different and later my wife actually made a claim that i have left the country in 2007.

Now i was wondering if i can take this case to the adjudicator and would they take this case? and do you think i got any chance of winning this case?

Thanks.

[mohmmad786]

Sorry i forgot to mention this in my previous post but i have also found the 2007 letter(not the front part) from job centre where i had an appointment with the job centre for the NI number which was declined at that time.

[Greenie]

I don't get from the note on 27/07 that they advised your wife to make a single claim. My understanding is that they said if you left the uk she could make a single claim not that she should tell them you'd left the uk when you hadn't in order to make a single claim.

I may have missed something but I am not sure why this issue is relevant anyway as they are not recovering an overpayment from that period.

[mohmmad786]

I don't get from the note on 27/07 that they advised your wife to make a single claim. My understanding is that they said if you left the uk she could make a single claim not that she should tell them you'd left the uk when you hadn't in order to make a single claim.

I may have missed something but I am not sure why this issue is relevant anyway as they are not recovering an overpayment from that period.

Thankyou for the reply, sorry i had to go to pakistan as my mom was in hospital and just returned so took longer to reply.

Your understanding is correct that it was them who advised my wife to apply as a single parent as i did not had NINO. We applied twice for me to be able to go on tax credit claim but was declined. We even went at the job centre to apply for NI with everything we had but was turned down. Hence

25/07/2007 AT-advised applicant until ap2 gets his nino claim wont get put through-advised to contact person who is dealing with nino allocation-and let us know-advised as per guidance - If the customer is part of a couple they should make a joint claim.

27/07/2007 AT-TL call back re application. Explained until NINO allocated or Ap2 visa issued joint claim would not go through. AP2 may leave the country and AP1 could then put in single claim. TJ

I did not know how the system worked at that time and my wife has got a history of depression so she was not mentally strong and took the advice which was given to her. Now tax credit office are saying that notional entitlement could not be applied to this case as the previous case from 2007 was in wrong capacity but it was due to them giving us wrong advice. From what my understanding is that the rules were changed in 2009 where you can apply for tax credits with only one NI number but i am not sure what they were before 2009. As for notional entitlement, it is for people who are late in telling tax credit about the change in their circumstances.

I called the adjudicator office today and they said that i have to write a formal complaint to tax credit and they cannot take the case until i get a reply from them which says that i can take this case to adjudicators.

[mohmmad786]

I have been trying to search for older rules before the 2009 and found that there were some rules in 2003. Would these be the one applying to me in 2007?

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2003/653/made

I would really appreciate if someone could tell me as i cannot understand the legal language of regulations i was waiting for my immigration papers at the time in 2007.