Why thousands of families lost their child benefit after travelling abroad

Thousands of parents who went abroad and came back a different route had their child benefit payments mistakenly stopped, HMRC has admitted.

Around 23,500 families who claim child benefit in the UK are believed to have been hit by an error which saw their payments wrongly stopped as part of a crackdown on benefit fraud, according to The Guardian.

HMRC said it had sent letters to around 0.5 per cent of the 6.9m child benefit claimants in the UK with “payments suspended” while inquiries continued. New Feature

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In one case, a Lithuanian man who has been living in England for 24 years says he was “caught” by the taxman after going on holiday with his son to Italy via Stansted Airport.

Another case involved a woman who flew to Bristol f