Withdrawing new Working Tax Credits claim - please advise

[Ellis1988]

Hello all, this is my first time posting on here. I have been sick with worry regarding working tax credits and the new rules. I am self-employed and have been claiming WTC since July 2014. It was very helpful towards costs and I am not disputing that BUT the new sanctions were causing me anxiety. I renewed my WTC last Fri but telephoned today to withdraw the claim. The guy was very helpful and I explained that I am going back to college in Sept and will be doing a lot of unpaid placements, and, as such, my working hours and income will fall. He withdrew my new claim but said I will have to pay back the money they have been giving me since 5 April this year. No problem, I thought as much, and so I won't spend it.

 

But now I am reading horror stories about people being charged extreme amounts in over payments and I am worried this will happen to me. I have always been above board with my claims. i.e. 2014-15 I only earned £1880, and 2015-2016 I earned £3214 (declared on the WTC claim I want to withdraw). I think I am within their £2500 limit when it comes to an increase in my income, but I am so scared. I was receiving just under £54 a week.

 

Can anyone advise what the likely outcome will be? I am a self-employed author and so my hours were indeed long (proof as the books have been consistently coming out since early 2015). Sorry to ramble on, I have high functioning aspergers and quite bad anxiety and the people who I turn to for emotional support are not here at the moment. So this is a very worrying time.

 

Thanks in advance.

[honeybee13]

Hello and welcome to CAG.

 

I expect people who know about tax credits will be along later, but I just wanted to say that in my experience of this forum, the tax credits people aren't fierce, especially as you contacted them. From what I've read here, they're reasonable about repayment of any money that's been overpaid.

 

My best, HB

[ericsbrother]

you told them of a change that will occur in the future so you should still get the WTC until then, even if they have to make adjustments to the amount. Stop panicking, they will look at last years earnings and correct it for this year. The withdrawing wasnt necessary and will probably cause them to miscalculate to your disadvantage so when you get their correspondence read it very carefully before doing or saying anything else. If monies are owed they can only collect if your income is above a certain threshold and that is over £13k so that wont be until after you retire at this rate. Also, it is £2500 CHANGE in income, not total income