HMRC to Review Halt of 23,500 Child Benefit Payments

This benefit typically expires after eight weeks outside the UK, but many affected have complained that HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) withheld their funds after they had only been on holiday for a short time.

The move comes after MPs on the Treasury Select Committee demanded answers from the tax authority.

HMRC has apologized for any errors and said anyone who believes their benefits have been wrongly withheld should contact them.

In September, the government launched a crackdown on child benefit fraud, which it believes could save £350 million over five years.

The new system allows HMRC records to be compared with Home Office international travel data, and the tax authority used this data to stop payments to thousands of families.

But now all cases are being reviewed following a growing number of complaints from affected individuals who said they went on holiday and returned to the UK a short time later.

Eve Craven went to New York with her son for a five-day holiday. She told the BBC's Moneybox programme that almost 18 months after the trip, she received a letter stating that her son's child benefit had been stopped.

The letter cited her trip to the US and said there was no record of her return.

"It gave me a month basically to give them all the requested information to prove that I'd come back to the UK," she said.

"It's just a very big ask for something that they've messed up on, and they should have been able to sort out themselves."

Eve's child benefit has now been reinstated with missing payments backdated.