Tax underpayment after maternity leave

Hi all,

My wife and I received a letter from Revenue saying we've underpaid by circa 4k in 2023

We are jointly assessed. My wife took the full 26weeks paid maternity leave, starting in the last quarter of 2023 into this year, followed by 10weeks unpaid.

Nothing else has changed bar a generally minor regular incremental wage increase.

Incomes for tax are circa 50k and 30k.

My wife got paid her maternity benefit topped up to her regular wage from work (civil service) for the 12 weeks of 2023

Her income on SOL for 2023 is noted as her full wage plus 52 weeks of maternity benefit which is at nearly 10k more than what we actually received.

We have been taxed as such for the full year despite on the maternity benefit portion for 12/52 weeks.

Does this seem like an error has been made? Kids are expensive enough without getting landed with this bill out of the blue.

I need to recheck the figures when I get home from work as I may have missed something. Maybe its something that will rectify itself in 2024 after returning to work through PAYE repayments but it doesnt look set up that way.

Theyve reduced our tax credits for the next 4years to recoup the 4k in the meantime.

We have sent an enquiry online and will ring asap but looking for some help as to something obvious that we may have missed. Has anyone else had this or similar happen?

Was her salary deducted by the state maternity benefit amount? I seem to remember when my wife was on mat leave her employers salary was paid less the benefit amount

It sounds like another case of bad data being sent from Welfare into Revenue. Whatever about her employer correctly taxing the Maternity pay, which we cannot tell from the details provided. You should only be taxed for the Maternity Benefit payments received in 2023 in the tax year 2023. You need to make a complaint into Revenue, who will correct it. Revenue are more than aware of issues with DSP's data quality.

Thats what we were thinking.

An amended tax credit cert was issued in November where her credits went from 3400 yearly to 700 yearly.

Again not sure if that's correct for the time period in question or if has been applied correctly via payroll.

Overall pay from beginning of maternity leave at end of October until the end of the year was no different to what was received in the months prior to it.

Fortnightly payslip shows something like
Gross pay : xxxxx
Mat benefit 524
Mat benefit - 524

I think its more my initial thinking and as outlined by previous poster wherein that the maternity benefit hasn't been applied in the correct proportion for 2023.

I hope so because its 4k we'd rather have

looptheloop30 said:

We have sent an enquiry online and will ring asap but looking for some help as to something obvious that we may have missed. Has anyone else had this or similar happen?

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You are seeming to suggest that your SOL indicates that you received MAT for the full 12 months?
The first steps would be work out what you were actually paid for the full year, the tax due on that and the tax actually paid. Then where does that differ from the SOL.

The tax credit adjustment is to account for the way they pay the MAT but ignore that for the moment.

Ya there's a 10k difference between what we got and whats on SOL for 2023.

If that's the case, you need to go through the individual pay slips to identify the error. Theres real time reporting with revenue and you say that wife is in the civil service, so its unlikely that the income figure is incorrect. Its more likely that its DSP payment, but check your slips anyway. If you want to post the figures, that might help.

Definitely the dsp figure incorrect on SOL by the 10k