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Tamejoca
Starting Member
United Kingdom
6 Posts |
 Posted - 10 November 2010 : 11:18:20
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| Husband and I filed for bankruptcy in April. I don't work. He does. In July he was awarded £3100 back pay and a small increase in salary. When I first asked the OR's clerk, she wasn't sure but thought OR would claim some but not all of this. It took a few weeks for them to decide(by which time we had spent some as we had no HB and other expenses) - and they said they wanted it all back.In the meantime our Housing benefit was stopped, but on appeal they reinstated it on lesser amount. However, they wanted the overpayment due to increase and back pay, even though we explained the money was not ours to keep. We lost that argument :) Now, the NT code is in practice (since last month and the council wants last month's benefit paid back as well and has cancelled our HB due to the 'increase' in our salary. So we will be £652 down a month. Or say nothing they can do, it is council's decision, council say nothing they can do. Surely this must be sorted by now - I have found several posts about this from 2007 but none recent and none with how it all worked out, and none where they stand to lose so much a month. Whilst all this has gone on we have used the back pay for various things - we have a deficit budget each month, the car we borrowed from our parents broke down and we had to replace etc etc So now we are being chase by OR for that as well, what happens now we don't have it? |
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Bigal4787
forum expert
United Kingdom
641 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 11:43:53
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Hi Tamejoca,
It seems you've been pulled this way and that over the HB, NT code etc.
In relation to the back pay, if you've genuinely used the money to pay for essential domestic needs, and to purchase a replacement car(I take it your husband can demonstrate the need for a car in connection with his employment)then there's not much the OR can do to get it back, at worst you won't get ED. If you have any left, then you could offer to hand some of that over, however, with that amount involved it should not have taken a few weeks for the OR to decide, as an examiner I would have got on to my OR straightaway to decide what to do with the money, not wait 2-3 weeks.
As for the NT code, I take it your husband signed an NTIPA(basically for the OR's agents to collect any tax that would have been paid), in which case you wouldn't be benefiting from the increase, I think you need to get a specialist in this area of benefits to put a case to the council regarding the use of the NT code, as they've reduced the HB presuming that you are benefitting financially, when infact any increase is going to your bankruptcy estate.
Big Al |
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Tamejoca
Starting Member
United Kingdom
6 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 12:19:32
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Thanks for the reply Big Al, car is not really necessary for husband's work - he could make do with bus. However, 3 of my four children are in schools 7 and 8 miles away.We can certainly show bank statements - simple fact is , we need more money each month to live - and if money is in the account it goes out. We stupidly assumed they would allow us to keep some and the combination of no HB , then some but not as much (which took from 12th July - last HB to 7th September to sort) meant that during those weeks we used the back pay sum. If they decide the money spent was not essential we still have the problem of owing money we don't have.
We seem to be at stale mate with the ongoing HB , everyone says ask someone else. Council say we can appeal and go to court - we would like to think eventually a judge would see sense. However, this all takes time and from yesterday there will be no more HB coming in and we could take months to appeal/go to court - it was suggested on a forum somewhere we use the 'tax' payment we are paying Moon Bever. This doesn't seem a good idea and my husband is totally anti it. It would mean we have lost £652 pounds a month in benefit and would only gain the £462 we pay Moon Bever so we would still be £190 down. here comes rent arrears and all the problems that we were in before declaring ourselves BR in the first place ? i |
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Tamejoca
Starting Member
United Kingdom
6 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 12:24:25
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| sorry, yes he did sign something agreeing to pay tax amount each month. He has met with Council Appeals Officer informally (hubby works at council) and explained situation but while Appeals guy has sympathy and gets that we are not benefiting - on paper we are, as salary has gone up and the tax payment to Moon Bever is just a bill or debt that we pay and not taken into account when calculating benefit! I have no idea who to ask about how to deal with this other than the appeals route which takes too long. |
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RHB
Senior Member
1159 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 13:26:14
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| I think your husband is right that the tax needs to be sent to Moonbeaver. This is only to April, so your money will go down then in any case |
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Tamejoca
Starting Member
United Kingdom
6 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 13:34:12
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| Hi RHB - not sure what you mean by money will go down then anyway? obviously tax will come off from April and we will then get housing benefit again. However, for next five months we will be down £652 a month - that covers pretty much most of our household stuff - how do we cover that? if we have to wait for Hb then the only money we have available is Moon Bever payment - otherwise we cant afford food which is not supposed to be what happens. |
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RHB
Senior Member
1159 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 19:46:05
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| But the tax is to go to your bankruptcy, that's why you don't pay tax to the inland revenue. You're surely not paying 652 pounds a month in tax before you had the nil tax code??? |
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Tamejoca
Starting Member
United Kingdom
6 Posts |
Posted - 10 November 2010 : 22:42:14
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No we should get £652 a month housing benefit but that has been stopped thus we are now £652 down a month. In April the tax will revert to taxman - we pay £462 a month tax, so when that goes to taxman we will get the HB of £652 again.
sorry for confusion - I meant if we stop paying Moon Bever the tax amount of £462 as was suggested we will still be getting £190 a month less because of no HB |
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Back pay
