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News Archive September 2009 to 31 December 2009 Older news can be reached by clicking the menu buttons on the left. Merry Christmas ! 25 December 2009 A very Merry Christmas to everyone, from all of us here at Tax Credit Casualties. If you don't celebrate Christmas, then Happy Holidays! Hope, Peace and Goodwill to all Mankind. Website Upgrade Begins 15 December 2009 If you've seen the homepage, you'll know that the website upgrade has begun! This will be ongoing until .... well .... when it's finished, really! Existing pages will be upgraded one-by-one, until the site is complete. We certainly hope you like it, and would be interested to hear of any problems you have with any of the new pages (e-mail webmaster@TaxCC.org) . We know that the Facebook 'share' button doesn't always appear (Facebook's fault!), and that sometimes the pages might be a little slow to load because of the feed from our forum (the forum's fault, honest ....), but apart from those everything is hunky-dory. All of the new pages have been tested in the latest versions of Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Google Chrome and Opera, so if you do have any problems please make sure that your browser is up to date. Thank you. Computer Says ..... Well ...... Nothing, Really 22 October 2009 From the company that brought you such wonders as 'Zeroing of Salaries' (your fault you didn't notice it), comes the next exciting instalment of 'Total Incompetence', entitled 'We Don't Know What Happened'. The script:
I didn't believe it, either. So take a look yourself. (Thanks to 'Jules1213' for this one) Annual General Meeting 2009 14 October 2009 The Annual
General Meeting of Tax Credit Casualties is
scheduled for 2pm on Saturday 14 November
2009 in Rotherham, South Yorkshire. You can help us to fulfil our legal obligations for the AGM by registering as a Voting Member, and then submitting your votes when you receive your 'Voting E-mail'. It's quick and easy, and all done over the internet. You will be able to cast your vote on the TCC website, between 5 - 11 November 2009, but you MUST register as a Voting Member beforehand. Items for consideration and the meeting need to be sent to sarah@taxcc.org
by the end of Tuesday 2 November at the latest. Please
also e-mail Sarah if you are planning to attend. The AGM Agenda and Reports
will be available from our
AGM 2009 page. E-mails
explaining everything about AGM voting will be sent to
Voting Members on
5 November 2009. The AGM is important
- you need to have an elected Management Committee to work on your campaign in the coming year. The meeting will also give you a chance to have your say on how we have performed so far, and what we will do in the coming year.
Two Life Sentences, With No Chance Of Parole 14 October 2009 What's a life sentence nowadays? I would think that 25 years is a bit more than the going rate, but let's be generous. And if someone had two life sentences, they would normally run concurrently - as opposed to one after the other. Keep that thought in your mind as you read this short e-mail from one of our members:
HMRC are obviously ignoring anything to do with 'hardship' - if this overpayment has had to be stretched over 50 years, isn't it blatantly obvious that repayment would cause hardship? It should have been written off. Full stop! Yet more proof that Tax Credit overpayment victims are treated worse than thieves, murderers or rapists. The Busiest Stand in the Marquee! 13 October 2009
New Guide About Tax Credit Overpayments 13 October 2009 In partnership with the legal advice website advicenow, the LITRG has produced a guide about Tax Credit overpayments. Read the release announcement in the LITRG news article Help With Tax Credit Overpayments. The link to the new guide is a bit hard to find in the article, but is right at the bottom of the page. If you can't find it, use this one instead: Tax Credit Overpayments. Please read the guide and then take a couple of minutes to complete this LITRG survey. There are a couple of other LITRG articles that you might want to read: Childcare Costs & Tax Credits 20 September 2009 The LITRG has published a report on their website, "Childcare Warning to Parents". Under recent changes to the law in England, some providers of childcare who were approved for tax credits under the old rules must now meet new registration requirements. Parents should now check whether their providers are still registered under the new rules. If they continue to claim tax credits on childcare costs paid to unregistered providers, they could be left with large overpayments and possibly even penalties. TCC are interested to know whether HMRC have made parents aware of this change. Please let us know whether you've been informed or not, by e-mailing Graham@TaxCC.org . Don't forget to tell your friends! Portsmouth Liberal Democrats Call For Action! 18 September 2009 Setting an example to all MPs about the type of action they should be taking to sort out the Tax Credit mess, Portsmouth South MP Mike Hancock and Parliamentary Candidate for Portsmouth North, Darren Sanders, have called for an amnesty for all 'no-claimant-fault' overpayments generated between 2003 and 2005. In a press release issued yesterday, Mike Hancock CBE MP stated that he had written to both The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, and Parliamentary Ombudsman, Ann Abraham, calling for an amnesty and that all other recommendations from the Ombudsman's reports to be implemented. The press release and links to the letters are below. ********************************************************************************************************** PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE USE
END OF PRESS RELEASE Click on these links to read the letters that Mike Hancock CBE MP has written to The Chancellor and The Parliamentary Ombudsman. See our article below, 'What's That Smell?', (or our Research Library), for links to the Parliamentary Ombudsman's reports. ********************************************************************************************************** In the past, the Government response to calls for an amnesty has always been that "The Government has a responsibility to be fair to all tax payers and those who have been paid the correct amount of tax credits", which doesn't really wash, does it? Firstly, the latest figures available (2007-2008) show that only approximately 60% of claims are paid the "correct amount of Tax Credits "; 19.82% of all claims were overpaid, and 19.2% of all claims were underpaid. OK, so the underpaid claims are corrected after year end ..... but after 6 years it's still an absolutely shameful set of statistics, isn't it! Secondly, if the Government "has a responsibility to be fair to all tax payers", why are they wasting £millions of taxpayer's money chasing innocent, vulnerable, overpayment victims, (who are only overpayment victims because of the numerous faults of the very system that was meant to help them), instead of taking massive action to get the whole mess sorted out once and for all. Now that would save the taxpayer a few bob! Besides, the good, honest citizens who claim Tax Credits are taxpayers too. Thirdly, despite what people think, there have been amnesties in the past. They were some of those 'Sshh! Don't let anyone know ......' things. Fast tracking and other temporary policies have been applied to limited numbers of cases over limited periods. Why? To suit HMRC's purposes of clearing backlogs and to appear to be getting results, of course! In some cases thresholds were applied, such as all cases under £300 being written off. So it can, and has been, done. So don't say it can't. Now, copy and paste this article, then send it to your MP. Ask them what they are doing towards getting the Tax Credit mess sorted out. Do they know how you feel about it? No! So tell them. Tell them that there's an election coming up. Tell them that there have been over 8 million overpaid claims to date. Tell them it's a total that's growing every year. Tell them that's one huge amount of potential votes. They might just listen. Or maybe they don't really want to be re-elected. What's That Smell? 12 September 2009 Earlier this week we reported that Tax Credit overpayments had increased last year, something that came to light after HMRC had, very quietly (sshhh!), published the finalised 2007-08 figures on their website. What, no fanfares? No blaze of publicity, expertly spun? No celebratory fireworks issuing from every Tax Credit orifice? Nope. You see, any news that can rock the political boat - like bad publicity - is now released as if it's been hibernating under the biggest available rock for the past year. Bad news quietly crawls out, trying desperately not to be noticed. Slimy and spineless .... Why the need for all this stealth? Well, in the previous years figures, overpayments had dropped from 29.32% of all claims (2005-06) to 19.77% (2006-07). Was this achieved by improvements in how the Tax Credit system operates? More reactive, maybe? Better software for their computers, possibly? Nope, nope and nope again! It was achieved by HMRC moving the goalposts and increasing the Income Disregard to a massive £25,000. Now, TCC did say at the time that this was a one-off, and what were they going to do to get overpayments down into single figure percentage levels? Not a lot, it seems! The latest figures show that overpayments rose to 19.82% of all claims in 2007-08. Now, you might say that a "0.05% rise isn't much", unless (of course) you're one of the 3,365 extra families forced into debt by this 'wonderfully-thought-out' benefit. What this really means is that there is nothing more that can be done to realistically reduce the overpayment figures, without drastically changing the way that the whole Tax Credit system operates. Put another way, if you claim Tax Credits, there is a 1-in-5 chance that you're going to get an overpayment - and that's that! A 1-in-5 lottery that you and your family will be forced into debt, through this 'poverty reducing' benefit. Would a 20% failure rate be accepted in any other aspect of families lives? Any other 'benefit'? Something else recently quietly 'published' was the Parliamentary Ombudsman's (PO) Annual Report for 2008-09. In 2005-06, the PO published the scathing report 'Tax Credits: Putting Things Right', in which 12 recommendations were made. One of these recommendations, (number 10), suggested that "Consideration should be given to writing-off all excess and overpayments caused by official error which occurred during 2003-04 and 2004-05." Well, that certainly hasn't been done, and most of the other recommendations have been ignored, too. The 2006-07 PO report 'Tax Credits: Getting It Wrong' was equally bad for HMRC. Which makes it very worrying that, in the latest Parliamentary Ombudsman Annual Report, 2008-09: Every Complaint Matters, Tax Credits get only three, very small, mentions. The first, and only important mention, is to say that there was a 'significant decline in the number of complaints regarding Tax Credits'. Wonderful news! So why am I worried? Just how many complaints about Tax Credits did the Parliamentary Ombudsman deal with? That's the worrying bit - in a report entitled 'Every Complaint Matters', I think they mean every complaint matters except complaints about Tax Credits. If you take a look at the 'detailed statistical information' on page 56 of the report .... yep!, there's HMRC's total of 2,159 complaints. OK, now go to the detail (figure 14, continued) on page 61. Can you spot any figures for 'HMRC - Tax Credit Office'? No, I couldn't either. There are figures for:
But no Tax Credit Office figures!! And, yes, figures were published in previous years. So - 'Every Complaint Matters', yet we have a Parliamentary Ombudsman - whose original recommendations, made in previous reports, were largely ignored - suddenly totally ignoring the Tax Credit issue. Have complaints to the Parliamentary Ombudsman gone down significantly? Unfortunately, we'll probably never know. But know this: when Departments begin to bury figures, it's normally always for a reason. Tax Credit overpayment figures have risen this year. Is the problem going to be 'forced' to disappear ....... ? Is this yet further fuel to TCC's argument that overpayment victim's human rights are being breached? After HMRC, The Adjudicator is the next step on the overpayment dispute ladder. This 'fair and unbiased' referee is actually appointed by HMRC. The Parliamentary Ombudsman is the last separate right of appeal against a decision about the overpayment of Tax Credits. So why is the Tax Credit overpayment issue being ignored? Whatever happened to the Human Rights of people who aren't thieves, murderers, rapists or terrorists? Now, what's that smell? TCC Support Citizens
Advice 'Tax Credit Debt Write-Off' Campaign
10 September 2009 TCC At The Rotherham Show 5 September 2009 TCC will be present at The Rotherham Show in Rosehill Victoria Park on Saturday 12th September to give advice to local claimants with tax credit problems. Paula and Sarah will be in the Voluntary Action Rotherham (VAR) tent which will have a ‘Money Maze’ theme for the day. If you are in the area do pop in and see us. Christmas Card Competition 5 September 2009 Last year we left it very late, so we're kicking off our Christmas card competition early this year! Yep! Design the card that you would like TCC to send to Gordon Brown and gang, wishing them a really happy 'Tax Credit' Christmas! (with bells on, if you want). Here's last years winner, by Ali Myers-Ward: 2008 Winning Christmas Card. Send your entries to the Webmaster by close of play on the 30 November, and we'll put them on the site so that all of our members can vote for a winner. If you win, then we'll send you a prize of some sort - but best not to expect anything too grand (we're totally unfunded, and totally skint! All donations gratefully received). There are only two rules: It's got to be your own work, and it mustn't need any censoring! So, no bad language or nasty stuff .... Christmas is the season of goodwill, after all! Outside of that, it's up to you; funny, serious, thoughtful, flippant - whatever. Let's have loads of entries ..... Benefit Simplification Proposal 5 September 2009 The Centre for Policy Studies has produced a report, 'Benefit Simplification: How, and Why, it Must Be Done', detailing how benefits should be overhauled to simplify the process. Read the article on the BBC website, 'Call to simplify benefits claims'. These sweeping and radical proposals would bring all benefits in to line where possible, so Tax Credits would be moved to a weekly rather than annual assessment in line with other benefits. The proposals also include moving the administration of all benefits to one central agency; at the moment benefits are administered by HMRC, DWP and Local Authorities making a quagmire of application forms, differing rules and regulations, and a lack of communication between the various agencies. The proposal suggests that DWP are best placed to administer all benefits – an advantage for casualties of Tax Credits, as DWP understand benefits and claimants, whereas HMRC have a collection culture from years of collecting tax. The proposed changes to the system should result in a more transparent process for claimants, reductions in fraud and reductions in administration costs. The far-reaching suggestions also include changes to tax collection to stop the current system of HMRC collecting income tax to give it back to the same people as tax credit payments – a process which creates inefficiency, overpayments and money shuffling for no net gain. TCC support these proposals which should bring a better system and increased fairness to tax credits. If you agree when you've read it, please send the report to your MP so that they know about it, too. |
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Tax Credit Casualties (TCC) is a voluntary, unfunded, not for profit
organisation run by members for members. We cannot take any responsibility for
decisions made by HMRC, The Parliamentary Ombudsman, The Adjudicator, or any
other organisation, regarding claimants cases. We offer free advice on how to
dispute unfair overpayments based on our own experiences, the experiences of
other claimants and HMRC guidelines.
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The
Rotherham Branch of TCC (aka Sarah and Paula)
had a stand at the Rotherham Show, a large local
community fete which was held on 12 September
2009. Voluntary Action Rotherham (VAR) hosted a
marquee on the theme of the Money Maze,
collecting together local organisations that
could offer support in financial matters. These
ranged from benefits advice to budgeting and
debt management, and VAR had kindly invited TCC
to be there too.
A
recent small pot of funding for publicity
materials meant we had a really professional
display that caught the attention of those who
didn’t even know they were looking for us until
they found us.