Suggested Searches: faq personal finance
MSE News: Government U-turn on childcare voucher tax relief
This is the discussion thread for the following MSE News Story:
"Parents of young children were today celebrating a Government U-turn which preserved tax relief on childcare vouchers ..."
Read the full story:
Government U-turn on childcare voucher tax relief
Seems like a more sensible solution. Government is always going to find it impossible to remove this kind of relief from one group, just as it would if it removed the winter fuel allowance or when it withdrew the 10% tax band. However, we are all going to have to pay ￡5,000 more in tax per household just to pay for the bank bail out, let alone the billions the government is currently spending on public sector salaries and pensions that it is not getting back in tax receipts. Being honest and raising income tax or VAT seems to be a better option than tinkering with credits, tax reliefs or charging property taxes on million pound homes. Unfortunately honesty with the electorate is in short supply from all parties in the run up to the election where populism is the name of the game! R.
A line in the article suggests that the tax relief will remain for those already in the scheme in 2011. I don't have any children yet, but having recently got married this is on the cards in the short to medium term. Am I (and my wife) best off starting to collect vouchers when our respective company benefit renewal dates come round in 2010 so that we are "in the scheme"? I am a higher rate tax payer, while my wife has a basic salary which is basic rate, but can earn commission which usually takes her (just) into the higher rate band. I guess as there is a limit to how many vouchers one can purchase with tax relief in a year, it makes sense to start buying them now anyway so we can maximise the vouchers we accrue? Or do they come with a "use by date" which would render them void if not used within a certain time? If we end up not having children, are they transferable to other parents?
Good news! For my family, the vouchers make a massive difference to our family life so for the tax relief to continue is excellent news. - Hurrah!
This is a subsidy for having children! Don't have kids if you can't afford them without state help! The world is over-populated already . . . so perhaps those of us who don't have kids (for whatever reason) should be rewarded instead!! Rant over.
glossy, would you rather people sat at home spongeing off benefits when they could be at work, because without help for childcare costs they couldnt afford to work? do you even know what these vouchers are? they are a salary sacrifice, people that use the scheme arent getting something for nothing!
Yes, I do know what they are . . . I have colleagues who are very well paid and do not actually need any help with childcare costs who take advantage of this scheme. Why should they get a tax break? I reiterate my point . . . if you can't afford to have children without state help then don't have them!!
glossy, in answer to your question, we should provide incentives for everything the government wants to promote, this is their main way of ensuring trends continue. Emlou has already said that it encourages working parents. There are also tax breaks to incentivise pensions, savings, giving to charity... All good things to offer incentives for aren't they? I'm not really sure I understand why you are against them, please can you explain a bit more? Thanks.
I don't understand why people should be incentivised to have children? I have to confess I also don't understand why anyone has a child and then wants to go back to work? As I said before, people who cannot afford to support a child should not be doing so. All the implications of having a child, including the financial ones, should be considered carefully beforehand. I am sure that there are many responsible parents out there but in my personal experience, they are outweighed by those who are not. Sorry, I sincerely don't intend to be offensive to anyone . . . I am simply tired of seeing people with children getting priority with just about everything, from parking spaces to extra government benefits. I am a single woman with no kids (for several reasons) and seem to be last in the queue for virtually everything and it is very frustrating. People in the same situation as me are a significant part of the current UK population and I know I am not alone in these views.
well i for one DO find your comments extremely offensive, and it seems to me that you knew your comments would be offensive because you felt the need to apologise for this before posting. it seems to me that perhaps you bear a grudge to those with children because you are a single woman with none of your own? if i worked on your theory that people should stay at home with their children and not work or not have them in the first place, i would never have been able to have children. in an ideal world i would love to stay at home with my son and not have to work because my OH earnt enough to provide for us both, but unfortunately this isnt an ideal world. instead of claiming benefits to stay at home with him, which i would be able to do, i choose to work and pay my way. i pay my own taxes, i pay my own rent. and then i claim child benefit, which may i add is not a means tested benefit, millionaires could claim that if they could be bothered, and then i also claim tax credits for childcare for my son. i would still be better off not working, staying at home to claim housing benefit and hundreds of pounds worth of tax credits, but the fact is i have enough self respect not to do that! oh, and one more thing - parent and child parking isnt actually priority parking, its spaces that are wide so we can open our car doors enough to not dent others car doors. you try getting a baby out the back of a 3 door car, you'd need extra space too. that isnt a privelige, thats a necessity!
I'm having exactly the same thoughts. My wife and I have just started trying to have our first child which may take a while for reasons I won't go into. My company's flexible benefits renewal is the end of the year (deadline tomorrow actually) and I'm thinking about joining the childcare vouchers Scheme but buying the minimum vouchers each month (￡35). This way, I will hopefully have got in under the wire and be able to get 40% tax relief. Does anyone know if this will work? In particular, would I be able to increase the amount purchased when we did have a child? It sounds simple enough but like most Government policies, the devil is in the detail!!
I didn't know the goverment had plans to mess with this scheme as well. At least some comon sense has prevailed. It is the only means of help I get towards relief of childcare costs. And when your childcare costs close to ￡13K a year and your partner is classed as a student (which means no help with any costs) everything helps. The tax and NI that I get back (approximately ￡900 a year) just about covers the employers NI that I have to pay (approx ￡800 a year) and the ofsted registration fee (over ￡100) so I do not see it as a benefit or incentive at all like some have described. It is just another way of redistributing my earnings. I am actually providing the goverment a service by employing someone who could actually be claming benefits from the system and all of us.
No this is a subsidy for those who have children and who work to pay for them. At least get your facts straight before you post.
If we all took your advice, then there would be no future generations!! I wanted children, but also knew I would have to work to support them, same as the majority of working parents in the UK. I did not want to go back to work, I had to. Childcare ￡460 a month, tax credits gives me about ￡132 a month towards it. I do not feel I was given an incentive to have children, but an incentive to enable me to remain in the workforce and provide for my children myself, instead of being supported by the state when I didn't need to be.
Seems like a more sensible solution. Government is always going to find it impossible to remove this kind of relief from one group, just as it would if it removed the winter fuel allowance or when it withdrew the 10% tax band. However, we are all going to have to pay ￡5,000 more in tax per household just to pay for the bank bail out, let alone the billions the government is currently spending on public sector salaries and pensions that it is not getting back in tax receipts. Being honest and raising income tax or VAT seems to be a better option than tinkering with credits, tax reliefs or charging property taxes on million pound homes. Unfortunately honesty with the electorate is in short supply from all parties in the run up to the election where populism is the name of the game! R.
A line in the article suggests that the tax relief will remain for those already in the scheme in 2011. I don't have any children yet, but having recently got married this is on the cards in the short to medium term. Am I (and my wife) best off starting to collect vouchers when our respective company benefit renewal dates come round in 2010 so that we are "in the scheme"? I am a higher rate tax payer, while my wife has a basic salary which is basic rate, but can earn commission which usually takes her (just) into the higher rate band. I guess as there is a limit to how many vouchers one can purchase with tax relief in a year, it makes sense to start buying them now anyway so we can maximise the vouchers we accrue? Or do they come with a "use by date" which would render them void if not used within a certain time? If we end up not having children, are they transferable to other parents?
Good news! For my family, the vouchers make a massive difference to our family life so for the tax relief to continue is excellent news. - Hurrah!
This is a subsidy for having children! Don't have kids if you can't afford them without state help! The world is over-populated already . . . so perhaps those of us who don't have kids (for whatever reason) should be rewarded instead!! Rant over.
glossy, would you rather people sat at home spongeing off benefits when they could be at work, because without help for childcare costs they couldnt afford to work? do you even know what these vouchers are? they are a salary sacrifice, people that use the scheme arent getting something for nothing!
Yes, I do know what they are . . . I have colleagues who are very well paid and do not actually need any help with childcare costs who take advantage of this scheme. Why should they get a tax break? I reiterate my point . . . if you can't afford to have children without state help then don't have them!!
glossy, in answer to your question, we should provide incentives for everything the government wants to promote, this is their main way of ensuring trends continue. Emlou has already said that it encourages working parents. There are also tax breaks to incentivise pensions, savings, giving to charity... All good things to offer incentives for aren't they? I'm not really sure I understand why you are against them, please can you explain a bit more? Thanks.
I don't understand why people should be incentivised to have children? I have to confess I also don't understand why anyone has a child and then wants to go back to work? As I said before, people who cannot afford to support a child should not be doing so. All the implications of having a child, including the financial ones, should be considered carefully beforehand. I am sure that there are many responsible parents out there but in my personal experience, they are outweighed by those who are not. Sorry, I sincerely don't intend to be offensive to anyone . . . I am simply tired of seeing people with children getting priority with just about everything, from parking spaces to extra government benefits. I am a single woman with no kids (for several reasons) and seem to be last in the queue for virtually everything and it is very frustrating. People in the same situation as me are a significant part of the current UK population and I know I am not alone in these views.
well i for one DO find your comments extremely offensive, and it seems to me that you knew your comments would be offensive because you felt the need to apologise for this before posting. it seems to me that perhaps you bear a grudge to those with children because you are a single woman with none of your own? if i worked on your theory that people should stay at home with their children and not work or not have them in the first place, i would never have been able to have children. in an ideal world i would love to stay at home with my son and not have to work because my OH earnt enough to provide for us both, but unfortunately this isnt an ideal world. instead of claiming benefits to stay at home with him, which i would be able to do, i choose to work and pay my way. i pay my own taxes, i pay my own rent. and then i claim child benefit, which may i add is not a means tested benefit, millionaires could claim that if they could be bothered, and then i also claim tax credits for childcare for my son. i would still be better off not working, staying at home to claim housing benefit and hundreds of pounds worth of tax credits, but the fact is i have enough self respect not to do that! oh, and one more thing - parent and child parking isnt actually priority parking, its spaces that are wide so we can open our car doors enough to not dent others car doors. you try getting a baby out the back of a 3 door car, you'd need extra space too. that isnt a privelige, thats a necessity!
I'm having exactly the same thoughts. My wife and I have just started trying to have our first child which may take a while for reasons I won't go into. My company's flexible benefits renewal is the end of the year (deadline tomorrow actually) and I'm thinking about joining the childcare vouchers Scheme but buying the minimum vouchers each month (￡35). This way, I will hopefully have got in under the wire and be able to get 40% tax relief. Does anyone know if this will work? In particular, would I be able to increase the amount purchased when we did have a child? It sounds simple enough but like most Government policies, the devil is in the detail!!
I didn't know the goverment had plans to mess with this scheme as well. At least some comon sense has prevailed. It is the only means of help I get towards relief of childcare costs. And when your childcare costs close to ￡13K a year and your partner is classed as a student (which means no help with any costs) everything helps. The tax and NI that I get back (approximately ￡900 a year) just about covers the employers NI that I have to pay (approx ￡800 a year) and the ofsted registration fee (over ￡100) so I do not see it as a benefit or incentive at all like some have described. It is just another way of redistributing my earnings. I am actually providing the goverment a service by employing someone who could actually be claming benefits from the system and all of us.
No this is a subsidy for those who have children and who work to pay for them. At least get your facts straight before you post.
If we all took your advice, then there would be no future generations!! I wanted children, but also knew I would have to work to support them, same as the majority of working parents in the UK. I did not want to go back to work, I had to. Childcare ￡460 a month, tax credits gives me about ￡132 a month towards it. I do not feel I was given an incentive to have children, but an incentive to enable me to remain in the workforce and provide for my children myself, instead of being supported by the state when I didn't need to be.