TWSS - employer says no, revenue says yes

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TheReflex

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Last year, my employer announced they were applying for TWSS. After a week, employees were told they were not getting TWSS after all.

We then got told that to deal with the potential loss of revenue during lockdowns, we'd get our salaries cut temporarily by 15% (which was deemed illegal, but that's another story). Our payslips still had no mention of any TWSS whatsoever as, supposedly, we were not receiving it.

I have recently contacted revenue to get a Statement of Liability (formerly P21) for 2020, and was surprised to find that my income had, supposedly, included €455.66 of TWSS ! I contacted Revenue and they confirmed my employer were in fact receiving TWSS in 2020.

I'm not exactly sure what's happening here. Was this €455.66 money I was supposed to get from my employer? And am I (or was I) being taxed for a TWSS that I did not receive?
 
1) Does it matter to you whether your employer got TWSS or not?
2) You got a salary each month. Were the payslips correct?
3) Do the gross amounts on the payslips add up to the gross amount on the P21?

If so, then you have not paid too much tax.

Brendan
 
The employer was only supposed to be paid their TWSS after they confirmed that the employee had got the subsidy. So if you were told you were not being paid it and the employer had claimed for it then something smelly is going on at your employer side. If revenue are saying your income included this and you are satisfied you've not received it then you should be pointing out the "error" to your employer.
 
If an employer claimed TWSS, this was meant to be shown on your payslip along with any top-up payment made.

It sounds as if your employer did not amend your payslip as they should have
 
Brendan Burgess said:
1) Does it matter to you whether your employer got TWSS or not?
2) You got a salary each month. Were the payslips correct?
3) Do the gross amounts on the payslips add up to the gross amount on the P21?

If so, then you have not paid too much tax.

Brendan
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1) "Matter" not really, but I reason that I am not to trust an employer that already committed an illegality by unilaterally cutting salaries
2) The total/final values I believe so, but no mention of TWSS
3) Hard to say, numbers don't quite add up and the P21 has the TWSS on a separate parcel. It "estimates" I need to pay €200 more tax for 2020, but I stopped filling out when I noticed the whole TWSS discrepancy

Peanuts20 said:
The employer was only supposed to be paid their TWSS after they confirmed that the employee had got the subsidy. So if you were told you were not being paid it and the employer had claimed for it then something smelly is going on at your employer side. If revenue are saying your income included this and you are satisfied you've not received it then you should be pointing out the "error" to your employer.
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I left said employer a few weeks ago. From previous experience, I doubt they would do anything if an employee pointed out something is amiss

jpd said:
If an employer claimed TWSS, this was meant to be shown on your payslip along with any top-up payment made.

It sounds as if your employer did not amend your payslip as they should have
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Last I talked to my employer, they insisted they did not receive TWSS whatsoever, so hard to know if it's just a matter of a payslip that should have been amended, or something else
 
The TWSS payments were paid gross ie no tax deducted so it does matter as to whether you received a TWSS payment or no.

If you can get the detail of the payments on myAccount you should be able to check the tax deducted. If you got a TWSS payment, then the tax deducted would have been less than normal ie by about 200 which is why the Revenue are now saying that you owe 200
 
Revenue did a check during the year on employers claiming the subsidy and asked employers to show payslips demonstrating that TWSS was being paid to employees. Therefore it should show on your payslip. Whilst tax enforcement is paused for the time being owing to the pandemic, I suspect Revenue will be very unforgiving to employers who claimed the subsidy and did not pass on the benefit to employees.
 
It sounds more like the benefit was passed on but not recorded on the employee's payslip
 
jpd said:
It sounds more like the benefit was passed on but not recorded on the employee's payslip
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It seems to be this. I've only managed to identify the TWSS payment on one specific payslip where the PRSI category is marked as J9 .

The company indeed benefitted from TWSS (they're on the official revenue list ) and why they told us they weren't, or why they decided to stop it and apply a 15% paycut instead is still a mistery, but I don't really care anymore, just happy to know tax-wise things are alright.

Thanks all!
 
There is some bad advice on this thread. If does matter if TWSS was paid to the Employer and they did not pass it on the Employee as a Net amount, appearing on the Employee's Payslip. The OP (Employee) will be charged both Income Tax and USC on the TWSS amount, which Revenue have currently deferred. A TWSS value of 455.66 is at least two weeks of TWSS. If the employee was paid 'normally' (with an 15% pay cut) they will be double taxed on the TWSS value.

Revenue's TWSS Reconciliation ended on the 30 June, this gave employers a chance to properly report and correct any issues. If your MyAccount still shows TWSS and it is not show on as Net Amount on your Payslip then report it to Revenue via MyEnquiries. They plan to start on auditing employers on site who claimed TWSS from August.

BTW: The payment should be labelled "GovC19 WageSub" or similar on your payslip.
 
Towger said:
There is some bad advice on this thread. If does matter if TWSS was paid to the Employer and they did not pass it on the Employee as a Net amount, appearing on the Employee's Payslip. The OP (Employee) will be charged both Income Tax and USC on the TWSS amount, which Revenue have currently deferred. A TWSS value of 455.66 is at least two weeks of TWSS. If the employee was paid 'normally' (with an 15% pay cut) they will be double taxed on the TWSS value.

Revenue's TWSS Reconciliation ended on the 30 June, this gave employers a chance to properly report and correct any issues. If your MyAccount still shows TWSS and it is not show on as Net Amount on your Payslip then report it to Revenue via MyEnquiries. They plan to start on auditing employers on site who claimed TWSS from August.

BTW: The payment should be labelled "GovC19 WageSub" or similar on your payslip.
Click to expand...

The 455.66 shows as an unidentified parcel on the "non taxable adjustment" section. The only other value there I normally would have is -56.09 of the health insurance that I paid for my wife.
 
If the amount was given to you 'non taxable' you are fine. Unless you are filing Form 11 etc, Revenue will collect the tax by reducing you RPN values in future years.
 
For those employers who claimed TWSS and were not so entitled, or who didn’t properly process the entitlement through their own payroll systems, Revenue will soon likely be enforcing against any defaulting employers.
 
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