as bad service goes 7 years to resolve is unbelievable!

good luck wonky100 !!

actually found this on the tax credit calculator Statutory Maternity Pay To help you take time off work when you have a baby, you may be able to get Statutory Maternity Pay (SMP), a weekly payment from your employer. If you had a child (or adopted a child) in the last tax year you may have taken statutory maternity, adoption or paternity leave during the year and your employer may have paid you statutory maternity, adoption or paternity pay. SMP is a taxable income, but for tax credits purposes £100 a week is ignored. You need to deduct £100 from your income for each week you received SMP. If you were on maternity leave but your employer did not pay you SMP, you may have claimed Maternity Allowance instead. Do not include Maternity Allowance received as this is not counted as income for tax credits purposes. There is no mention of deducting for anything other than statutory maternity pay?

I'm not sure I know the answer but just to check are you saying you got more than statutory maternity pay from 01/08/11 to 31/01/12 (I am guessing you got a higher contractual maternity pay for this period?) I know that for SMP you can disregard £100 per week - I do not know the answer if it is contractual maternity pay I'm afraid?

And by putting in a £2500 disregard on lowering wages in a year they have further cut the payouts just when you need it most As I'm being made redundant but have a very young baby I can't earn enough to work and pay the childcare (especially as I have a child at school as well) so now I'm for the first time in my life going to have to claim benefits as my partner doesn't earn enough to keep our family going on his wages alone and until my bubs is at least a year old I don't have any family that can help take him in the day I think therefore the 2500 disregard in drop in income is going to reduce my ctc just when I need them most leaving us heavily relying on my redundancy payout until I can get back in to work yet still there is no way I can keep making the minimum payments on my credit card and catalogue account - its going to be a very tough year! Getting through smp took all our savings! Childcare costs are too high for young babies - oh and let's not forget that because the government cut funding my schools after school club has closed too

its not much notice for people - must be a nightmare

I work for a nursery in the accounts department and can confirm they do telephone nurseries to confirm the charges for nursery fees for particular families on occasions so I expect they would

Hi I've just put some paragraphs in your post as i was having a lot of trouble reading it in one big block. I know how easy it is to just write and write with no gaps when you are frustrated about something! I'm afraid i don't know the answer to your question. It seems to me that the third option would be I would go for if I were you! Have you tried writing to your MP again with the latest info? It surely couldn't hurt to get them involved again? oh and as for the £8000 can you not just phone them and tell them this is wrong - they should then be able to recalculate the current award on the correct figures?

You can sometimes fight the big guys - I assisted my sister in a complaint to the benefits people whereby they had underpaid her for 2 years without her knowledge as they put sanctions against her (relating to csa claim) without telling her and they refused to backdate the increase. It took 3 letters but we got the money she was rightfully owed. They admitted the CSA information was a mess so they couldn't be sure she hadn't sent back the relevant form (which she had). I also had a disagreement with the job centre over incorrect information they gave me when I needed to sign off of job seekers allowance and again they refused to pay me 2 weeks money but after 2 complaint letters to the job centre and then a call in which I asked for the chief executives contact details they decided they were wrong and paid me what I was owed! Its always worth arguing as it only costs a few stamps My tip is to find the top person if your complaint gets nowhere and send details to the chief executive!

i read about this the other day for 1 child the limit will be much lower - they sneaked that change through nice and quietly!!

Hopefully this should help as a guide but please do check all the figures and calculations yourself to make sure you are happy with them your weekly rate should be £313.46 90% is around £285 (rounded up) you can disregard £100 so 6 weeks @ £185 = £1110 SMP will be £135.45 but again you can disregard £100 so 33 weeks @ £35.45 = 1169.85 total fir 9 months off on statutory maternity would be £2279.85 you would also (I presume) have 3 months at full pay which would be 13 weeks @ £313.46 = £4075 i make the total around 6354.85 for you You should know though that I have post pregnancy baby brain so please do check all the above calculations if your not going back for a year it will be a little lower

Sorry not sure if this is the right place. After much assistance in the employment section on here I am now aware of what I shall be being paid for my redundancy payments whilst on maternity leave but I have a tax question and can't find the answer through google. I will be being paid 14 weeks SMP as a lump sum when my employment is terminated at the end of March to cover my SMP due for March - early June. This SMP should have taken me to early june 2012 and therefore would not have attracted tax or national insurance as it would have been below the threshold (personal allowance) if it was paid monthly instead of a lump sum. I am therefore going to now pay Tax & NHI on the whole amount (as I will be receiving notice pay, a retention bonus as well in March payment) and as it is the end of the tax year I would not get a rebate in the usual way. From looking around I don't think there is anything that can be done about the national insurance but is there anyway to ask the tax man to rebate the tax on the SMP portion that should have covered April - June 2012 and if so can anyone point me in the right direction? (I understand i cannot work before the SMP period is up or else I have to pay back any portion overpaid so surely therefore HMRC must consider these future earnings so it must surely be possible to get the tax back - at the moment I will be losing out quite a lot on my SMP just because I got made redundant which doesn't seem fair)

Thank you Sidewinder I am proud of my won status

Yay!!!!!!!!!!! I have had a letter stating they do not agree that I should have had the info or that I was discriminated against but as they do not want a protracted legal battle over the matter they are offering me the amount equivalent to the bonus to settle the matter! Thank you soooo much Mariefab, Sidewinder and BRB (and they don't want me to do any work or KIT days they are effectively just settling I really appreciate all the help and pointers in the right direction I received on here - I wouldn't have got so far without you Oh and now I have the breakdown they are paying me my slary rate for the 4 weeks notice plus SMP as well (thats very generous of them!) I of course have to sign my right away to sue them but I shall now happily do this!

I know its only a couple of grand - alot to me - not a lot to them!! I didn't as I couldn't remember it off hand (cases aren't very catchy all I remember is GUS homeshopping vs someone lol)