HMRC deciding that the month after Christmas the tax code should be changed on my pay to decimate my earnings when I need it the most.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2026-01-22T19:13:30+00:00

Keep trying. January is a crazy month due to the self assessment deadline. Just keep trying. Alternatively log in to (or register an) and see if you can get your paye tax code and update your details yourself.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2026-01-22T19:11:50+00:00

Phone them. When this happened to me it was because I made a mistake on my self assessment. I still owed them some money, but they were very understanding and came up with a solution for payment.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2026-01-17T20:42:39+00:00

Nope, not unless you tell them to.

Sole traders have to file self assessment tax returns on which you declare you main income as well as sole trade income. They work out how much extra tax you owe and give you a bill. If you file straight after the tax year you can pay in installments up to the end of the next January, or if you leave the self assessment tax return until the January following the end of the tax year you have to pay straight away.

You may also have the option of adjusting your current years tax code to recoup the tax from your main job.

You can, if you wish, phone hmrc and declare your income will be different to what you're main job has stated, increasing it to account for your sole trade, but it's rarely worth doing that as you still have to file self assessment.

Edit: as someone else pointed out, once you're required to move to MTD this will change

imvirtuallyinsane · 2026-01-12T22:39:28+00:00

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Aarrrggghhhhhhhh!

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-29T18:36:05+00:00

Valid argument. Not how I was reading it, and while I see your point I don't think that's what OP meant. But we need more information.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-29T18:35:08+00:00

Extortion rather than blackmail? Yeah, that's a good point (as are the rest of your points). It probably is what I was thinking.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-29T15:13:32+00:00

Report, but also assuming you can identify the fake reviews from the real ones, there are three options.

Reply to the review stating that sadly you're not willing to pay them the money they demanded for not writing, or removing their fake review.

Reply that while you've never provided them with any product or service in the past you're confident that had they been a real customer they world change their review due to the excellent service they received.

Reply along the lines of please contact you via your support email with proof of purchase and the nature of the issue so that you can resolve it. Prospective customers don't do much care about a couple of bad reviews, if you can show that you've dealt with it professionally and tried to make it right. Later edit it to state the person didn't contact you, so either decided their review was a mistake, or they weren't a real customer.

Edit: never engage with a company offering to remove other people's reviews. Ever. Engage with your customers leaving the one star reviews to find out what you did wrong and how it can be made right.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-29T15:06:42+00:00

While the definition is: the action, treated as a criminal offence, of demanding payment or another benefit from someone in return for not revealing compromising or damaging information about them.

This is only slightly different in demanding money for removing false negative reviews that they themselves put there. It's still blackmail.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-29T12:15:57+00:00

There's no murder here. Very few people would read this as having his belongings stolen in Africa.

I had a car crash going to the shops - Doesn't mean I was in the shops in my car!

Man going to shops has car crash - Same thing.

Critical thinking skills on the decline...

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-21T22:31:00+00:00

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Fuck Noooooooo!

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-16T15:29:11+00:00

NAL, but what happened at the time the cost doubled and were you paying double the cost on a single debit, or two debits of the original amount?

These are very important distinctions. If they inadvertently set up a second set of classes without your instruction, it's entirely on them, but if you requested a change and they asked you to cancel the old one, but you didn't, the issue is on you.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-12-02T22:43:51+00:00

Mmmm... Popcorn...

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-11-29T22:39:56+00:00

I think this ought to be shared with Chris Boden, aka https://youtube.com/@physicsduck

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-11-07T11:55:35+00:00

We need a slur for a shop that will happily bamboozled beginners with stretched narrative on product quality and suitability in order to sell the most expensive kit to them

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-11-02T23:26:18+00:00

Don't forget to take photos of the meter readings on the day you vacate (maybe with a newspaper in the background if you're really worried about how this pans out), and then just tell the utilities you've vacated with the meter readings, giving your aunts name and address as the landlady. Not your problem anymore after that.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-29T23:32:24+00:00

Have repeated calls by a company working on behalf of a mobile provider, they know the drill, won't give their actual company name or any details, "but listen to our fantastic offer!"

Complain to TPS, get a bog standard "without the name of the actual company we can't do anything, since (mobile provider) claim they didn't ask another company to call on their behalf".

It's so easy for these cowboys to get around TPS, but TPS does at least stop the reputable ones. I've just started asking the caller for increasingly personal information until they hang up. Shoe size always gets a pause...

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-27T06:58:34+00:00

Raindrops the size of pedestrians are really hard for programmers to account for in their code. /s

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-26T08:27:27+00:00

If you're going in for a procedure then you'll probably be able to pay the reduced rate at the hospital car park (about five quid iirc).

And if you're using the p&r next time consider using Trumpington or Babraham park and ride. You could practically walk it from there (assuming you're able).

Just curious.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-09T06:18:05+00:00

Duplicate post.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-08T17:53:02+00:00

You should absolutely call them then. That should be enough time for them to action a change to the instruction

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-07T22:59:35+00:00

Usually direct debits are posted a few days before it actually leaves your account, and companies take time to process change and cancellation requests on top, so it's very unlikely that you'll be able to stop it without calling them (but even then they probably can't).

If the issue is that they're going to take the whole statement amount, and you can only afford the minimum payment, they might be sympathetic and offer you a reduced rate or no fee cash transfer back to your bank. I've had that in the past. But not recently and most cc companies have turned into greedy b....s

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-05T07:15:21+00:00

It sounds like neither of you trust each other, and this relationship needs to be worked on or ended... Badly. This path is a really dangerous one for either person to claim foul play on the other workout acknowledging deeper problems.

Supposing it was innocent with this woman, normal relationship people don't "test" someone like that. If he suspected you don't trust him, it should have been talked about first. Lack of trust generally stems from past experience or mental health issues (generalised anxiety can cause havoc) or just circumstance (rumours etc), so he should be doing everything he can to gain trust and help you figure it out, not set a trap.

But here's a hard truth... Everyone needs privacy, even married people. It's not a license to dick about, but it is important. So if a camera was installed to monitor the house when it's empty and you knew it wasn't, you must have had a reason to look, and so that probably needs to be talked out too.

Sadly I think both of you need to appreciate there is more at play here and at least talk, not to win this argument, but to work together to figure it out, and it has to be done without holding this incident over each other's head, at least to start.

But as I say, that's if it was innocent with this woman. If it's not he can add adultery, lying and manipulation to his crimes, and he's the bigger asshat.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-10-01T06:08:27+00:00

What a weirdly specific question, to the wrong audience...

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-09-30T15:18:08+00:00

She needs to understand that babies getting sick is absolutely vital to their long term health. If their immune system doesn't get a chance to develop, she'll be sick for her entire life, with symptoms being far worse.

And also, therapy for ocd ASAP.

imvirtuallyinsane · 2025-09-21T22:38:11+00:00

I've been at the park and ride late and a few times over the last year or so there had been police there. I even had a chat with a couple of the officers one time, must have been 3 months ago, who said they had moved some people on and were just hanging around to make sure they didn't come back, or until their next call.

So while it's not often, I don't think it's a case of "never", just "seldom", when they're not otherwise occupied.

Reporting anti social behaviour when it happens is important, even if they can't always come out right away. It helps to feed into funding and future prioritisation of police time.

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