News
More than 5m taxed incorrectly under PAYE
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) will write to 5.5m people to tell them they overpaid or underpaid tax under the Pay As You Earn (PAYE) system last year.
The Telegraph reported that the average error amount is estimated to be £300.
Approximately 3.5m taxpayers paid too little and will have to repay HMRC over future years. Some 2m paid too much and will be able to claim money back. The year prior just 5.2m people paid the wrong amount of tax through PAYE.
The growth in the number of errors is despite the introduction of HMRC’s Real Time Information (RTI) programme, which is meant to make the tax system more accurate. According to The Telegraph this programme will have cost taxpayers at least £273m by next year.
RTI requires employers to report wage payments to HMRC weekly or monthly.
David Heaton of Baker Tilly told The Telegraph: “RTI was supposed to make PAYE more accurate, not less. So why are there more [errors] this year, with RTI in full flow, than last year, when RTI was only a pilot? The number of PAYE differences has risen, not fallen. Something in RTI is not working.”
A spokesperson for HMRC told The Telegraph that growing number of errors was due to an increase in the number of people in employment and that the effects of RTI had not yet been reflected in the figures.
