Rush to claim back overpaid tax Higher-rate taxpayers are being urged to claim back overpaid tax and missed reliefs from HM Revenue & Customs before its too late. Traditionally, taxpayers had almost six years to reclaim overpaid tax, but HMRC cut this back to four years last April. This means anyone wanting to claim back overpaid tax for the year 2008/2009 needs to act before April 5 2013. Richard Mannion, national tax director at Smith & Williamson, the accountancy and investment management group, says those who could be eligible for rebates include pensioners and low earners who have had tax deducted at source from bank and building society interest, as well as pensioners who have not received higher age-related personal allowances. Then there are higher-rate taxpayers who have not claimed the extra 20 per cent relief for pension contributions or for gift aid donations to charity. "Thousands of people each year fail to claim back tax that they have overpaid to HMRC," says Mannion. This can be simply because these individuals don't know that they are eligible for a rebate, or it could be that they made a mistake on their tax return and have only just realised it is inaccurate. He says one of the most common examples of individuals not claiming tax is on pension contributions. This is because members of personal pension schemes, including group personal pension schemes and self-invested personal pensions only receive basic rate tax relief at 20 per cent automatically. The additional 20 per cent relief available for higher rate taxpayers must be reclaimed by the individual. Mannion says another example of people overpaying tax involves people who have only worked for part of the year, perhaps due to redundancy or because they have become self-employed. "If you are on Pay As You Earn (PAYE) and you leave a company halfway through the year you may have six months worth of unused tax allowances," he said. Individual claims for overpaid tax can be made by writing to, or calling HMRC.