BENEFITS EXPERT: Help! I am worried that I may not be eligible for support

The bureau has received a number of queries from people who receive the disability element with their Working Tax Credits awards normally requesting confirmation of whether the claimant is also getting PIP, DLA or Attendance Allowance and the claimant's have never claimed or received theses benefits.

We are also aware of a similar pattern across the rest of the country.

The inference from the letter is that there may have been an overpayment or nil entitlement to Working Tax Credits.

It is important for people in this situation to note there are a number of other qualifying routes to get Working Tax Credits in this situation and the correspondence sent from HMRC does not make this clear.

Our advice in this situation is to confirm with HMRC what benefits you are or have been getting and then await a decision letter.

If there has been an overpayment and you are told that this was due to not getting a qualifying benefit then you should seek advice about challenging this, you may have been entitled and still entitled based on other criteria.

We are hoping that these letters may have been sent in error but unfortunately there is currently no clarification from HMRC despite requests made via agencies or through MP queries.

Q. I am worried that I may not be eligible for support under the self-employed income scheme as I did not trade for a full year in Tax Year 2018/19 although I did submit details of my trading profits, etc. for the partial year I traded.

I resumed self-employment in tax year 2019/2020 and continued to trade until lockdown.

Will the partial trading year adversely affect entitlement?

A. No, there is no requirement that you must have traded a full year for 2018/19, as long as you submitted the 2018/19 tax return on or before the cut-off date of 23/4/2020 and you appear to meet the remaining criteria then you will be assessed for a payment.