You may need to pay the High Income Child Benefit Charge (HICBC) if you or your partner have an individual income over the threshold and either:
- you or your partner get Child Benefit
- someone else gets Child Benefit for a child living with you and they contribute at least an equal amount towards the child’s upkeep
It does not matter if the child living with you is not your own child.
Thresholds
The current thresholds are:
| Tax years from 2024/25 | Over £60,000 |
| Tax years up to and including 2023/24 | Over £50,000 |
The charge is applied to the total ‘adjusted net income’ which is your total taxable income, before any allowances are deducted, but does not include Gift Aid.
Taxable income also includes interest from savings and/or dividends.
Who pays the charge?
If your adjusted net income is over the threshold and so is your partner’s, then whoever has the higher income is responsible for paying the tax charge.
What if my income is over the threshold?
You can choose to either:
- get Child Benefit payments and pay any tax charge (HMRC website) at the end of each tax year
- opt out of getting payments and not pay the tax charge
Where do I declare that I need to pay this?
You’ll be asked about your income on your tax return.
The below options relate to your MalgraBooks package:
- Essentials: Ensure you indicate that you receive Child Benefit as indicated on the tax return form (see here for details)
- Advanced/Premium or Managed Packages: Please inform our team when we are preparing your tax return, and we’ll include this into your tax calculation.