Child benefit claims increase following changes to the income rule. After the government modified the guidelines regarding the amount of income parents might make and still be eligible, the number of new child benefit claim s increased in April.
An FOI (freedom of information) request from the BBC revealed that there were 86,656 new claims filed, an increase of 16% from the previous month.
Once they reach a specific salary level, parents must begin returning a portion of the benefit; under the March Budget, this is whenJeremy Hunt, the chancellor, announced that the cutoff will occur in April.
According to one expert, the notification would have reminded those who were previously qualified to claim it, in addition to making new people eligible to do so.
provided you have a kid under the age of sixteen, or under the age of twenty provided the child continues in authorised education or training, you may be eligible to receive child benefit.
The benefit for a child may only be claimed by one person. For the oldest or only kid, the weekly payments are £25.60, while for younger children, they are £16.95.
However, after one parent begins to earn a particular amount, benefits are decreased; this is referred to as the High Income Child Benefit Charge (HICBC).
The income threshold at which recipients must begin repaying a portion of the benefit increased to £60,000 on April 6 from £50,000, and the income threshold at which benefits are fully withdrawn increased to £80,000.
His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), which handles applications for child benefit, was questioned by the BBC’s Freedom of Information request about the number of new claims that were filed each month between the start of last year and May of this year.
During that time, April had a much higher number of claims than any other month.
HMRC said that it occasionally receives rival applications that are submitted after a household breakdown or duplicate claims that are submitted in error.
“The increase in claims in April is encouraging,” AJ Bell’s director of personal finance Laura Suter stated.
“It’s likely that the announcement by the government had a dual effect: it made more people eligible for the benefit and so they claimed, but it also put child benefit in the news and reminded other parents who were already eligible that they should claim it.”
Nevertheless, she continued, “we’re coming from a low base” because the benefit is “chronically underclaimed”.
According to the most recent yearly statistics, the number of families receiving child benefit payments has fallen to the lowest point ever documented, she added.
Because they would have had to pay the HICBC, 683,000 families—or 1.05 million children—opted not to receive the funds.
“If these families had been eligible they could have claimed £1.15bn in additional support,” said Ms. Suter.