Do They Know It's Christmas Time At All?

by Alison Myers-Ward

I’m blogging this, Slavetothetaxman, rather than adding a comment, as others might find this helpful too – I hope. Here’s what I would do. I’d write a stern letter to HMRC and quote their own responsibilities back to them. Here’s what HMRC say these are:

HM Revenue and Customs should:

• Give correct advice
• Record and use information accurately
• Correct errors notified by claimant
• Update reported changes in circumstances within 30 days

So I’d go back to the letter where HMRC admit their mistake and quote the words they’ve used and give the date of the letter so they can verify if themselves, as they are a tad daft when it comes to reviewing cases. Evidently somewhere along the line they have messed up on at least one of the above. I would quote the sentence or sentences which apply to them.

While doing this, I’d also take a look at all the data I’d been sent in response to my Subject Access Request (see www.TaxCC.org dispute pack for details) and cite every separate instance I was now aware of in which HMRC failed to meet their responsibilities to me.

After soothing the pain in my newly writers-cramped fingers, I would next study the responsibilities HMRC sets out for its claimants (retrospectively, of course – these people aren’t entirely stupid):

The main responsibilities for the claimant (from 1 February 2008) are to:

• Give accurate, complete and up to date information
• Report changes in circumstances
• Use the checklist to check every award notice
• Tell HMRC of errors in an award notice within 1 month
• Check that amounts received agree with the award notice

Then I would cite every example I can identify of my being fully honest and compliant. Did my income change? My couple status? Did I have a baby? Claim DLA? If something changed and I reported this, I’d flag up in a similar way to the above how I had met my responsibilities. If by any chance I failed to meet a responsibility, I’d consider why that was. Am I evil and corrupt? Well, my children think I am at times, but actually, no. So why didn’t I do this? If, for example, I didn’t do it because it wasn’t intuitive and HMRC never told me I had to, or told me I had to do something different – why, that would mean that HMRC failed to ‘give correct advice’, wouldn’t it?

Once I’d written this letter, I’d ‘cc’ it to the world and her husband. So at the very least, that’s my elected MP, and (the amazing) Paula Dean at Tax Credit Casualties. However, it could also be copied to Stephen Timms, Financial Secretary to the Treasury who apparently oversees tax credits, and any representatives I had from organizations such as CAB, Tax Aid, LITRG, CPAG, One Parent Families, my Trade Union Welfare department, etc. Oh yes, a newspaper journalist might also be interested, so I’d copy my current favourite in for good measure.

Bullies of the HMRC kind prefer to beat people up in dark alleys – they don’t relish doing it under the watchful eye of the News of the World or Sunday Times. In my experience, brave folk who are happy to talk to a reporter often get the speediest resolution to their case ever to be seen.

Good luck. Justice may yet prevail.

Do they know it’s Christmas time at all?

www.TaxCC.org