family tax credit fraud and the CSA

[Beanmistriss]

My boyfriend put in a claim for family tax credit and they rung him up yesterday to say someone was already claiming for that child. Turns out that his ex has been frudulently claiming family tax credits for the past year that the child has lived with us (it is a year since his father had the child benefit put into his name). The CSA have been chasing her for payment since he moved in with us and but she claims not to be working and they can find no record of her recieving benifits (shes paying a mortgage so assume shes working cash in hand or something). My question is that if the CSA can get proof from the family tax credit people that she had an income from them that she did not declare (even if it was frudulent) can they then backdate her CSA payments to the date on which they first contacted her? Hope that makes sense. Also does anyone know the likley course of action the tax credit people will take? Will she just have to pay it back (she has been caught defrauding the benefits system before and made to pay it back) Thanks

[jadedy04]

the csa can investigate with wtc people, and they should back date it to when you first got in contact with them. i think tax credits will make her pay it all back, hope it helps

[PinkFizz]

Yes,if it can be proved then the tax office will make her pay all the tax credits back,and they will NOT be pleased - they may even decide to prosecute her if it can be proved that she deliberately claimed for a child that wasn't living with her.

Again ,the csa can back date up to 6 years as I was told by them last week,but that may be hard if she is getting cash in hand.

[Whickerman]

She'll have to pay it back with interest and penalties. And will probably end up in court,

[Beanmistriss]

Thanks guys. The csa havent been able to get money out of her cos there is no record of her having any income, wages, claiming benefits etc. Can they count her family tax credits income as an income to claim back payments for CSA from?

[PinkFizz]

Yes,I believe that any money she had coming into the house would be classed as income.

Have to say though - it sounds a bit odd - id she had no history of any wages whatsoever (coz it was cash) they how will she explain not applying for any benefits?
And how will she explain running a home etc on no money?? tax credits is merely a top up to low wages.

[Beanmistriss]

Shes a very odd lady pinkfizz! The CSA made a mess of their computer entries so held up the claim for months. The are getting ready just now to do a house visit so she can explain to them how shes managing to pay her bills on no money. I will be interested to hear her explaination :)

[PinkFizz]

I would imagine that she pas put totally different details on the csa and the tax credit forms.For the csa she would have had to say she was either on Income Support or such a low wage that she didnt earn enought to pay.And she would have had to name an employer or an exact benefit.

With the tax credit you can only get if it you work,not on benefits,so she must have named a job as you have to give full employersdetails\(I have done this myself)

Will be interesting as you say!

[Beanmistriss]

She would have had a job when she applied but she left it without notice 4 days after the csa posted their first claim letter to her. So she would have had a job to put down originally she just kept on claiming when she shouldnt have.

[themas]

PinkFizz - you can get tax credit without working. It is child tax credit and she could have got it simply by claiming as if the child was living with her, whether she was working or not.

If the child was living with her before living with Beanmistriss then she could have been claiming validly at that time and just not told the Tax Credit people that the child was no longer with her.