In Meades v HMRC [2023] UKFTT 544 (TC) (15 June 2023) the FTT upheld a closure notice which imposed the high income child benefit charge (HICBC) even though the taxpayer had separated from the mother with whom the child lived and remarried.
The taxpayer (M) and his wife had a child in 2012. As M took responsibility for paperwork he made the claim for child benefit in respect of the child but it was paid into the mother’s bank account. In 2017 the couple separated and M moved out. He continued to pay maintenance and also paid the household bills of the mother and child. He remarried in 2019. HMRC carried out an enquiry into his 2019/20 tax return and issued a closure notice on the basis that he was chargeable to the HICBC for that year. M appealed.
HMRC initially argued that the charge applied because...
