[NannyOgg]

What has anyone done about thier UK family allowance? We are goign the visitors visa, work permit, PR route. At what point am I no longer entitled to recieve it?

Just wondered cos at the moment £115 stirling a month converts into NZ$345!

Thanks

Nanny

[Avalon]

What has anyone done about thier UK family allowance? We are goign the visitors visa, work permit, PR route. At what point am I no longer entitled to recieve it?

Just wondered cos at the moment £115 stirling a month converts into NZ$345!

Thanks

Nanny

Well, lots of people "forget" to tell the authorities back home at all.

However - found this at:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/childbenefit/eligible.htm#abroad

I go to live abroad or visit?

You must tell us straight away if you, your child, children or all of you leave the UK permanently or for an absence that is likely to last for more than a year when you leave. If you are going abroad permanently but your child is staying in the UK and living with someone else, the person they are staying with should get in touch with us and claim Child Benefit.

If you go abroad temporarily you can continue to get Child Benefit
for up to 8 weeks, whatever the reason for your absence
for the first 12 weeks you are abroad if you go or stay abroad because you are, or a member of your family is, receiving treatment for an illness or disability or because a member of your family has died.
You must tell us if you are going abroad longer than this. If you left the UK after the 6 April 2003, you will be treated as being abroad temporarily if your absence is unlikely to last for more than a year when you leave.

If your right to stay in the UK is under a limit or condition and you have been getting Child Benefit since before 7 October 1996 you may lose the right to get Child Benefit again if you stay abroad for more than 8 weeks. If you want to know more about this, get in touch with the Child Benefit Office.

If your child goes abroad temporarily you can continue to get Child Benefit for them for up to 12 weeks. You must tell us if your child is leaving the UK for more than 12 weeks.
If your child is temporarily abroad for more than 12 weeks you may still get Child Benefit if they are abroad only for one of the following reasons:

to receive full-time education in an EEA country or Switzerland
to make an educational or foreign visit that is approved in writing by their school
to get medical treatment for an illness that began before the child left the UK.

Hope that helps: essentially my reading is that until you get a work visa or a pr visa - you are still only leaving temporarily.

[NannyOgg]

Thanks for that Avalon.

Ooooohh my memory is terrible these days! ;)

[katandbob]

the same goes for your working tax credits....I rang them in April (the Tax lady that sorted our P60's and got rob his rebate sorted said to leave it till then as the tax credits were doing their end of year and wouldnt be able to sort out anything till after then, but when I rang at the end of the month, they said oooh its too soon, ring when you are leaving the country.....!

Kat

[Avalon]

Ooooohh my memory is terrible these days! ;)
Thought it might :nice1

[StevieD]

Must be an age thing or the emigration process makes us forgetful! LOL

[Marie P]

Tax credit people sent us a letter yesterday ,gave them a call ,We are getting £793 credited to our account ...... :raebanana

Was scared to call em ........thought they were asking us for that amount :roll

Marie x

[StevieD]

Why did they owe you? What reason? I don't trust them at all.

[Cardy]

Hello we had to stop ours the day we left but we qualify for family assistance in NZ as we have permanent residence we have 3 kids and even though i get a decent wage here we get $267 a fortnight. there a bit slow processing it but we get bak pay we are owed at end of year so they tell me. Have you got PR? make sure you have got ird numbers for all your kids as they ask for them and you will have to wai ages if you dont have them. you also have to photocopy your passport on the page they stamp when you land in NZ and send that with your application or they send it back.Hope this helps pm us if you need more info...Cheers Cardy :cheers

[tonyb]

Hi Cardy

Di you get family assistance as soon as you got to New Zealand as someone on here said that you have to wait for 2 years befor you become entitled to it

Tony

[Bubbles]

Hi, What a strange conversation I've just had.

Just got off the phone from the Child Benefit office. First, I was given another number to ring as it was to do with moving abroad. This is the number for the ' Child Benefit International Enquiry Line '................0845 3021454.
Rang the number and spoke to a very nice, but strange lady. This is how the conversation went after I'd give her the usual name, address and N.I number.


CB lady - 'How can I help'

ME - 'Hello, I'd like to inform you that my family and I are emigrating and will be leaving the UK Sept 20th, what do I need to do ?'

CB lady - 'Don't tell me that, I don't want to know that yet, oh dear me !!!'

ME - 'I'm sorry, I'm not sure I follow you' :confused:

She then started to whisper down the phone to me explaining that she wasn't supposed to tell me this because she'd get into trouble, so I had to listen. :laugh

CB lady - If you tell me you are emigrating we will have to stop your Child allowance from the date of your departure. What you really need to do is about a week before you leave give us another call and tell us that you will be out of the country and in NZ for upto 6 mnths, just on a temporary basis. We will then continue to credit your UK account for that period as normal. After that you will need to call us again and say you are staying in NZ. We can then process you and cancel things our end.

ME - Oh, ok then. Thankyou.

CB lady - My pleasure. I hope the move goes really well for you. Now don't forget to call just before you leave and don't mention anything about NZ residence, you're there just temporary, remember. Goodbye.

Once again, this was all said in a whispered voice.

:laugh :laugh
So there you have it. Straight from the horses mouth, all beit a whispering one.

John

[Lupin]

I'm surprised about that because we were in OZ and NZ for ten months and when we returned had another baby. At some point I ticked a box to say I'd been overseas and it transpired I was supposed to tell them (as I was holidaying, I didn't really think of it) and had to pay back all but 8 weeks worth, as that was how long you were allowed to be holidaying and still receive child benefit, according to the official wisdom then!

[Bubbles]

I know what you mean, I was surprised too.
I was taken aback by the way the conversation went, but I'm only passing on what I was whispered by a Child Benefit enquiry lady.

John

[NannyOgg]

Blimey! Thanks for that John !

[willsken]

Thanks for that. I for one will do exactly that! :D

[katandbob]

Hi, What a strange conversation I've just had.

Just got off the phone from the Child Benefit office. First, I was given another number to ring as it was to do with moving abroad. This is the number for the ' Child Benefit International Enquiry Line '................0845 3021454.
Rang the number and spoke to a very nice, but strange lady. This is how the conversation went after I'd give her the usual name, address and N.I number.


CB lady - 'How can I help'

ME - 'Hello, I'd like to inform you that my family and I are emigrating and will be leaving the UK Sept 20th, what do I need to do ?'

CB lady - 'Don't tell me that, I don't want to know that yet, oh dear me !!!'

ME - 'I'm sorry, I'm not sure I follow you' :confused:

She then started to whisper down the phone to me explaining that she wasn't supposed to tell me this because she'd get into trouble, so I had to listen.

CB lady - If you tell me you are emigrating we will have to stop your Child allowance from the date of your departure. What you really need to do is about a week before you leave give us another call and tell us that you will be out of the country and in NZ for upto 6 mnths, just on a temporary basis. We will then continue to credit your UK account for that period as normal. After that you will need to call us again and say you are staying in NZ. We can then process you and cancel things our end.

ME - Oh, ok then. Thankyou.

CB lady - My pleasure. I hope the move goes really well for you. Now don't forget to call just before you leave and don't mention anything about NZ residence, you're there just temporary, remember. Goodbye.

Once again, this was all said in a whispered voice.


So there you have it. Straight from the horses mouth, all beit a whispering one.

John

cheers John..........with us going and the boys staying I was wondering if I could leave it.....Jasons will run out anyway in September, So I think I will just use the Website and email them to say that we have moved to NZ and that Jason has too - In September :nice1


He will be eligible for NZ allowance so I will sort that out for when he arrives

Cheers :cheers

Kat

[Paul & Rach]

Great post - thanks guys !!!

[Moorf]

That whispered conversation almost sounded like she was part of a resistance movement :laugh - "leeezon veeerrrry carefully, I shall say zis only vonce" - or perhaps a UK Escape Committee member :D

[Diny]

Big brother caught up with me (God knows how). They paid me for 3 months after we left the UK and then wrote to tell me to pay it back because they understood we had left on a permanent basis.

I have absolutely NO idea how they got this info, and yes, I did inform them just before we left that we'd be out of the country for a few months on a temp basis.

They also included a nice little passage at the bottom of the letter telling me that if the amount wasn't paid back in full then I faced prosecution if/when I returned to the UK.

My advice, do everything above board - they may just catch up with you, and the longer you claim the more you have to pay back.

Diny

[firstkings]

Diny is right,

You wouldn't have a leg to stand on.

It is a fairly easy task for the CBO to check emigration records. They probably don't do it all the time at present, but it would only take a high profile case in the news to cause a thorough check on "benefit fraudsters". I don't fancy being arrested upon return to the country...

David

[Bubbles]

Hi all.

I did say it was ' a strange conversation ' I had with the CB lady.

Thanks for the heads up Diny with regard to the above. :nice1

John

[Marie P]

Hey Cardy ,

I owe you one of these :cheers

Got our family assistance letter today we are going to get $93 a week .

[we are going to try and not spend it though ,as a friend of mine ended up having to give a lot of it back at the end of the year as they earned more money than estimated , Dave works different hours each week so dont want that too happen to us ]

Did you get anything for the weeks before you applied ,my letter says payments from 19/07 .

Marie x

[spudulike]

Hi, when we moved in Feb I also contacted child benefit and said it was likely to be temporary and called again April when we decided we would definitely be going home after 2 years and have since recieved a letter to pay back all but a few weeks. I would certainly recommend being honest as 'if' you do return to the UK you will a) not want to be prosecuted :D and b) still want to claim child benefit again.

Louise