How to claim your tax back

Before we get ahead of ourselves, this blog post is how to claim tax back on medical expenses. You are entitled to claim 20% tax back on any medical expenses you paid, for yourself or for someone else i.e your child.

• You can only claim tax back if you have actually paid tax. (Not USC or PRSI)
• You cannot claim tax back if you have been refunded the medical expense from private health insurance.
• You may have underpaid your tax and Revenue can take this back.
• Generally people don't overpay tax but it can happen if you were out of work for part of the year.

Right so now that we're clear on the above lets get started!

The first thing you need to do is go onto Revenue.ie and log into 'My Account', if you haven't previously used this service you will have to set up an account. Once logged in click Review your tax 2014-2017, in the blue PAYE Services box on the left. 

Once into that section you want to submit a Form 12 for the year 2017 (and any other years you haven't done this for). 

Once you press 'Submit' you will be brought to a screen to confirm some details. This form should be pre-populated so you shouldn't have to fill anything in, just click through to check that all the information is correct. In the PAYE Income section it should show how much you made in the year 2017 from all employments. If an employment is missing you will have to fill in the details of your earnings and tax paid, which you can get from your P60 or last payslip of the year.

After everything is confirmed you can add Non PAYE Income if necessary such as extra income that hasn't been taxed. (If you do have extra income this may be taxed)

Finally you can get to adding your medical expenses (doctors visits, prescriptions charges, consultant fees etc.) Once you are on the Tax Credits & Reliefs tab you can click into Heath and then Health Expenses (top left in below picture) and add how much you spent in the year 2017.

Once you have your medical expenses added you just need to confirm your other tax credits which are usually a Personal Tax Credit and a PAYE Tax Credit.

And then you are done! Once you are finished with that you just sign off on it with your password. With 2-3 days you should receive a P21 balancing statement showing what refund is due to you. In the above case, assuming all tax paid throughout the year was correct, it would be a refund of €100 (20% of €500 medical expenses). These days the refund is paid directly into your bank account so you should have it within a week!

*Revenue can ask for proof of these medical expenses so keep your receipts for six years!

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