HMRC admits major child-benefit and state-pension miscalculations, promises repayments to millions
HMRC sent letters to the Treasury Committee outlining two large-scale mistakes—faulty child-benefit data checks and incorrect state-pension figures—affecting thousands of families and millions of taxpayers.
HMRC issued two apology letters to Treasury Committee chair Dame Meg Hillier this month, detailing major operational failures. The first concerned a child-benefit compliance sweep that, based on flawed Home Office travel data, wrongly stopped benefits for around 13,800 families, after an initial suspension of 23,800 households; the scheme’s success rate was later reported as 40 %. HMRC pledged to adopt NAO recommendations and return to normal processing.
The second letter addressed a historic error where an incorrect state-pension figure was used in PAYE year-end reconciliations and Self-Assessment pre-populations, affecting up to 3.2 million taxpayers. Corrections will be made through coding adjustments and other payment methods, with most repayments expected in the 2026-27 fiscal year, and a review offered for earlier years. HMRC apologized and committed to an internal audit to prevent recurrence.
Why it matters
The errors affect millions of UK taxpayers and expose weaknesses in government data handling for benefits and pensions.
In this story
