Thursday 31 March 2011

Coding Cock Ups



The ICAEW reports that HMRC have made a wee bit of a cock up (again) with the codings for people who started receiving the state pension in 2010/11.

It seems that the new pension has not been included in their tax codes.

The normal procedure is for the DWP to tell HMRC when it starts to pay a state pension, so that HMRC can put it in the pensioner's tax code.

Where this has not been done properly for 2010/11, the state pension will not have been taxed and those affected will have underpaid tax.

Those affected should be informed by HMRC via a P800.

HMRC has said that the A19 concession is not applicable this time, because the underpayments are for current tax. However, do bear in mind that they tried to claim that A19 was not applicable for earlier tax underpayments when in fact it was.

Underpayments of less that £2K will be coded out in future years' PAYE codes. HMRC should contact those with underpayments of more than £2K, and give them 3 years to have the underpayment "coded out".

However, just in case there is a cock up wrt communications here are two helplines for contacting HMRC:

- Taxpayers 0845 300 0627
- Agents 0845 366 7855

As to why this cock up has happened again is not clear. Maybe the communications between DWP and HMRC are not as watertight as they used to be?

Tax does have to be taxing.

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9 comments:

  1. Re-arrange the following words:
    Brothel-Blow Job- organise-couldn't -a-in-a......

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  2. Lol Have you tried dialling that telephone number Ken if you haven't give it a go and see how long it takes to get through

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  3. 11:30 is spot on.

    Breweries and Piss comes to mind also.

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  4. And of course the telephone number is premium rate and at the victims expense. Great little earner for the pantomime dames brave marauder's! especially when you (eventually) get through and are then having to explain the whole history of the world to some idiot with no interest in any problems this causes. Are these prats on a bonus to see how long they can keep you on the line?
    I have also had one of these muppets tell me 'it is not HMRC policy to deal with these matters by letter' and 'no we cannot telephone you back' Great service!

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  5. The system never was 'watertight'. The DSS would send a simple form (P46DWP) with the state pension details on it. If that got lost or stockpiled the code would never be amended and an underpayment would arise. When I used to work for HMRC it was not unusual to come across elderly pensioners that never had the pension coded. We would usually write off most of the arrears though. We could usually manufacture some reason for this and simply make a note of it in an establishment file that was never looked at, so we could easily get away with it. Most of us in our small office were nice people who would use our common sense. Despite what most of your readers think about HMRC staff, almost all the problems that arise are due to lack of staff/cost cutting not incompetence or laziness!

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  6. 'Despite what most of your readers think about HMRC staff, almost all the problems that arise are due to lack of staff/cost cutting not incompetence or laziness!'

    I can only sympathise 17.19, I have seen both sides of the coin, i.e: petrified pensioners that would literally shake with fear at the inquiry counter where I worked/toiled (long time ago)and then being on the receiving end (oh missus)of the nasty informal letters from HMRC and their outsourced goons.
    I refuse to make a premium rate call, and everyone else should do the same..therby clogging up the mail system just a little bit more......

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  7. Its end of year staff report time again, and my how these "muppets" will ensure they "earn" their gilt edged bonuses (top brass only Ethel, none of yer commoners 'ere!).
    Anyroads here are some sugggestions for comments on their staff reports:-
    "The only reason I can see for following this person is out of idle curiosity" or,
    "Having this person heading your Directorate is depriving some village of its idiot!"
    "Could not be trusted to run a cake stall at a Gymkhana"
    Where oh where is the accountability in all this?
    Let us hope that Parliament gets off its rear and does something to change this farce. At least the real Muppet Show had Statler & Waldorf running Pacesetter.

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  8. When is the Select Committee due to report on HMRC? It'll be a turkey shot.

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  9. Commons Select Committee = WHITEWASH, dey ain't goin' to do nuttin' serious Dude, just rap a few knuckles.

    And while we is at it yeah? Yo gottsa stop callin' dem Cnuts yeah? Cnuts is useful and dey ain't nowhere near useful! So don diss dem no more see?

    ReplyDelete