Individuals making their tax payments to HMRC by debit or credit cards may have to wait months for refunds under new procedures introduced, warned London-based chartered accountancy firm Blick Rothenberg. Personal tax partner Nimesh Shah explained: ‘HMRC has introduced a new procedure to pay refunds to the debit or credit card the person used to pay their tax. HMRC will make the refund to the card last used to pay a tax liability. This process will override the bank account details the person includes on their self-assessment tax return.’
Shah said that the reason given by HMRC to implement this new process is to ensure that they are following payment card industry guidelines. The rules state that refunds should only be made to the card used for the original transaction. Shah added: ‘I am extremely concerned by this new procedure and the lack of publicity by HMRC. Even though someone may specifically nominate an account on their tax return for HMRC to pay their refund, under this new approach, HMRC could make the payment to a completely different account. This could lead to repayments being misplaced.
‘More importantly, where the original account has been closed or the card expired, the person will need to contact HMRC to provide alternative details on how to receive the repayment. This could result in severe delays to repayments being made or, more worryingly, no repayments being made at all. People who are due repayment should check their accounts for the repayment. If the repayment is not made within 10 working days, we would recommend contacting HMRC to check the status of the repayment.’
Individuals making their tax payments to HMRC by debit or credit cards may have to wait months for refunds under new procedures introduced, warned London-based chartered accountancy firm Blick Rothenberg. Personal tax partner Nimesh Shah explained: ‘HMRC has introduced a new procedure to pay refunds to the debit or credit card the person used to pay their tax. HMRC will make the refund to the card last used to pay a tax liability. This process will override the bank account details the person includes on their self-assessment tax return.’
Shah said that the reason given by HMRC to implement this new process is to ensure that they are following payment card industry guidelines. The rules state that refunds should only be made to the card used for the original transaction. Shah added: ‘I am extremely concerned by this new procedure and the lack of publicity by HMRC. Even though someone may specifically nominate an account on their tax return for HMRC to pay their refund, under this new approach, HMRC could make the payment to a completely different account. This could lead to repayments being misplaced.
‘More importantly, where the original account has been closed or the card expired, the person will need to contact HMRC to provide alternative details on how to receive the repayment. This could result in severe delays to repayments being made or, more worryingly, no repayments being made at all. People who are due repayment should check their accounts for the repayment. If the repayment is not made within 10 working days, we would recommend contacting HMRC to check the status of the repayment.’
