{"id":45053,"date":"2025-08-05T07:10:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T07:10:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/45053\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T07:10:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T07:10:15","slug":"state-pensioners-caught-off-guard-after-becoming-casualty-of-hmrc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/45053\/","title":{"rendered":"State pensioners &#8216;caught off guard&#8217; after becoming &#8216;casualty&#8217; of HMRC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>HMRC, the tax arm of the Labour Party government, is set to issue a record number of shock bills this year.<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/0_hmrc.jpg\" alt=\"HMRC, the tax arm of the Labour Party government, is set to issue a record number of shock bills this year.\" loading=\"eager\"  \/>HMRC, the tax arm of the Labour Party government, is set to issue a record number of shock bills this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">HMRC is catching state pensioners off guard with a record number of tax bills. HMRC, the tax arm of the Labour Party government, is set to issue a record number of shock bills this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">It comes amid fiscal drag, which has seen frozen tax thresholds from the government drag more<a class=\"TextLink_text-link__dBSS0 TextLink_enabled__dJF3l\" href=\"https:\/\/www.birminghammail.co.uk\/all-about\/hmrc\" target=\"_self\" aria-label=\"\" tabindex=\"0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"> and more older people into the net. <\/a>The tax office said it will issue 1.4 million simple assessments for the 2024-25 tax year, a rise of 80,000 from 1.32 million the previous year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">Experts have warned that the tax demands \u201ccatch pensioners off guard\u201d <a class=\"TextLink_text-link__dBSS0 TextLink_enabled__dJF3l\" href=\"https:\/\/www.birminghammail.co.uk\/all-about\/hmrc\" target=\"_self\" aria-label=\"\" tabindex=\"0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">and that retirees have become a \u201ccasualty\u201d of the threshold freeze.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \"><a class=\"TextLink_text-link__dBSS0 TextLink_enabled__dJF3l\" href=\"https:\/\/www.birminghammail.co.uk\/motoring\/motoring-news\/drivers-handed-victory-uk-speed-32171621\" target=\"\" aria-label=\"\" tabindex=\"0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">READ MORE Drivers handed victory with UK speed limit tweak for &#8216;first time in two years&#8217;<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">Jon Greer, of wealth management firm Quilter, said: \u201cSimple assessment letters are a prime example of the consequence of stealth taxes in action.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">\u201cMuch of this rise is down to how frozen tax thresholds and higher state pensions are creating more tax liabilities for older people. A lot of these people will not even be aware that they may owe some sort of tax on their income and can catch many off guard.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">Sir Steve Webb, a former pensions minister, now partner at pension consultants LCP, said: \u201cThese figures highlight another casualty of the long-term freeze of personal tax thresholds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">\u201cWith every passing year, more and more pensioners on modest incomes are being dragged into the income tax net. With thresholds being frozen for years to come, more retired people will have to deal with this process in future\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">A Treasury spokesman said: \u201cWe are committed to help our pensioners live their lives with dignity and respect, which is why in April the basic and new state pension increased by 4.1pc.<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">\u201cPensioners will receive a boost of up to \u00a3470 to their income in 2025-26. Our commitment to the triple lock means millions will see their pension rise by up to \u00a31,900 this parliament.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"Paragraph_paragraph-text__PVKlh \">Anyone who believes an error has been made in the assessment should get in touch with HMRC within 60 days to query it. More information on how to contact HMRC is available on GOV.UK.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HMRC, the tax arm of the Labour Party government, is set to issue a record number of shock&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45054,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[84,4176,2218,4174,4175,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-45053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-finance","tag-hmrc","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45053\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}