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In the tax law of the United Kingdom, tax credit overpayment occurs when a claimant has received more Working Tax Credit (WTC) or Child Tax Credit (CTC) than HMRC’s final end of year calculations awards them. This can be caused by official or claimant error or neglect, or simply because the provisional payments were based, as is standard, on out of date information. The mechanics as a tax system are discussed elsewhere (see Working Tax Credit and tax credit.) This article is solely about overpayment. Since the implementation of the Tax Credit Act 2002 (TCA 2002) 〔TCA 2002〕 HMRC consider overpaid tax credit in the same light as unpaid income tax, and can use the full extent of their powers to pursue recovery (aka repayment) Records for each completed year (all awards up to date and closed) show that one third of all tax credit claims have been overpaid.〔PO report page 5〕〔Official HMRC Tax Credit Statistics section〕 In fact 1/3 are also underpaid, and only 1/3 paid correctly on average. == Causes of overpayment == A combination of several of the following may be responsible for any overpayment bill. Customer Error Applicants delaying informing HMRC of changes of circumstances (CoC's) such as children leaving a household, ending employment, or splitting from a partner. This also includes applicants giving incorrect information on making/updating claims, or failing to respond in a timely manner to deadlines in the Tax Credit process. Annualised taxation calculations Because entitlement to tax credits depends on the level of income received for the tax year it is being paid, the true award cannot be finalised until the end of that year, as such all payments are ‘provisional’ until an end of year calculation. The result is that an overpayment can be discovered at the end (or even during) an award. Inflexibility of the system HMRC did not anticipate claimants' incomes and circumstances would vary so much ‘in year’. The system operates retroactively, so delays allowing for changes to process mean overpayment can occur even if changes are reported timely. The resulting numerous and confusing paperwork amendments to claims caused additional problems. The Tax Credit Office initially took the decision not to require or act on notifications of circumstance changes ‘in year’ anyway, and instead save this information until the end of the year to factor into a single entitlement recalculation. This meant overpayments built up even where claimants notified HMRC of all changes of circumstance (CoC’s) Provisional payments made between the end of one claim and the processing of another assumed income was predictable and stable. In practice, income details used could be two years out of date and were not even being supplied by the claimant on which to base any current payments. The result was awards were not even properly started for that year and may already have been overpaid. Calculations and deductions HMRC told claimants to apply deductions before declaring their income if they had had a child in the previous year, reducing the gross figure of the claimant’s income and therefore increased their entitlement to a higher level of award. In reality, this actually caused an overpayment because it transpired that this calculation only worked when it was assumed that the claimant would not be going back to work in the following year. HMRC’s lack of experience with the TC client base Because HMRC as a whole, and the staff in general, were used to dealing with higher income earners, they had no understanding of the importance of reliable and secure awards, nor the empathy or experience to deal reasonably with frustrated, confused claimants who had variable circumstances and little previous experience of taxation. Take up of Tax Credit was far higher than expected and staff were working under pressure with fixed deadlines, little training, backlogs, confused claimants and inadequate facilities. Untrained and private sector staff were answering claimant’s calls, and callers were not advised of this. Annulled awards These types of overpayment bills are called 'annulled awards' because the Tax Credit Office have said the claimant didn't return the end of year declaration within the time limit. This automatically 'wipes out' their entitlement to all the payments they already received for that tax year. Wrong Capacity this is when a claim is terminated because HMRC believe the couple / single status of the adults on the award was wrong. Rather than the status being changed, the claim is automatically cancelled and all payments already made are ruled as overpaid. No replacement claim is calculated in the ''‘right’'' capacity unless the claimant invokes the dispute process and is able to successful argue for a Notional Entitlement assessment. The I.T infrastructure The computerised system on which processing, recording and calculating claimants awards was based was flawed. ‘Glitches’ in the systems mean records are lost or not logged, records were not kept of all communications to the Tax Credit Office, award notices that claimants are supposed to check are not posted or received, and the dual level system means that call operative give out the wrong information regarding claims because they cannot see all case information.〔Treasury committee report〕 The company responsible EDS were later sued by HMRC 〔Computer Weekly〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Tax credit overpayment」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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