tax check how much are you owed?

A question about : tax check how much are you owed?

Just a letter through the post from my works Trade Union about a company called taxbuddies who can complete a check to see if the IRS owe money to me (that would be very nice)https://www.taxbuddies.com/home.php

Might be worth a check its a no win no fee service and as its from my TU i would think pretty legit.

Any views/opinion welcome.... ;D

Best answers:

• Why pay someone else to do it, when you can do it yourself for free?
  Fill in the form R40 and send it to your tax office of one of these offices
• : Hey there...I have just completed the online form with Tax buddies....and i'll let you know how i get on...the thing with doing it yourself (and i know from experience) is that if you owe the Inland revenue money they start taking it immediately....this way if I do owe them money Tax Buddies give you a choice of letting the Inland Revenue know or not....so you can decide on your personal circumstances if you can afford to pay that bit of tax owing to them back or whether you want to wait a bit and pay it later....my husband hought he was due a rebate and sent all his pay slips etc back to them and found he owed them Its only this April he will have finished paying them back since last April!!!!
  Anyway like I said i'll let you know how i get on....whats 40% if I get back what i didnt even know i was owed!!!
• well just an update to say that I HAVE RECEIEVED NOTHING, YES THATS RIGHT .... NOTHING !!! since completeing that online form.... shouldi be suprised... ??? probably not.....more fool me.... >
• My wife got one of these forms through her union. It didn't ask anything about income - but did want full details of children, which suggests its all about unclaimed working families tax credit. In that case I'd rather risk going straight to the Inland Revenue and getting the whole amount.
• Another option is to fill in the self-assessment tax return on the Revenue website. Go right to the end where it shows how much tax you owe or they owe you. You then have the option to submit the return or cancel. If you choose to cancel then the Revenue have no record of what you owe and it's up to you what to do next.
  The only catch with this approach is you'll have to register on the Revenue website before you can access the self-assessment form and I think it takes about a week for them to post you the password. I think this is worth the potential 40% saving compared to the site mentioned above which sounds like a complete rip-off to me.
  Or you can send me all the details, I'll fill in the form and only keep 20% !!!
  I do feel I have to once again say that if you owe tax you should tell the Revenue but it's up to you whether to be honest or risk not declaring tax you owe and ending up with a big fine. As johnllew says, they will always listen to a sensible request to delay or spread payments.
  Andrew.
• It seems to me that TAXBUDDIES does not calculate your tax based on your income. It seems that they just work out what tax allowances you are entitled to and ensure that you claim them!
  If they think you are getting allowances you are not entitled to they let you know (for free) and let you decide what you want to do.
  But if are entitled to allowances you are not getting they will charge you 40% - presumably 40% of what the allowance would be for one year, rather than 40% each year???
  It seems that it is up to the individual to claim many allowances. For instance, the IR did not give my mum age alowance automatically even though they knew her age!
  But I would not use Taxbuddies to ensure I get my allowances. I would check myself by getting a list of the available allowances from the IR.
  Some of the suggestions made by others on this thread seem to be good ideas but none of them will tell you whether you are getting all the allowances you are entitled to. They are simply to check that your tax has been calculated correctly based on what allowances the IR has given you!
  THE MORAL IS CHECK YOU HAVE ALL THE ALLOWANCES YOU ARE ENTITLED TO AND THEN CALCULATE YOUR TAX BASED ON THE CORRECT ALLOWANCES!