TFC31500 | Childcare accounts: recovery of debts owed to HMRC by the holder of an inactive childcare account

Childcare Payments Act 2014, section 54(1) and (2)

Section 22 of the Act provides that when an account holder makes a withdrawal from an active childcare account, the amount of top-up payment which corresponds to that withdrawal must be returned to HMRC. Where a person makes a withdrawal from an inactive childcare account, and they are the account holder, if they owe a debt to HMRC in respect of recoverable top-up payments, the corresponding top-up element that is returned to HMRC will count as a payment against their debt.

Childcare Payments Act 2014, section 54(3)

Where any part of the corresponding top-up amount of a withdrawal is offset against a debt in this way, the amount of the withdrawal that generated the debt is to be ignored for the purposes of section 19(8) of the Act.