The government’s official statistics on property sales in the UK have been withdrawn from publication because they appear to be wrong.

The figures are published each month by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) for sales worth more than £40,000.

HMRC said that revisions to the previous months’ figures, going back to March this year, had cast doubt on their accuracy.

Figures for July were due to come out on Thursday, but have been postponed.

“Outputs obtained whilst updating the monthly series contained some significant and unexplained differences with the statistics published last month,” it said.

“All months in the statistical series are affected, with the differences showing falls in some months and increases in others,” it added.

“Our statisticians have come to the conclusion that something doesn’t look quite right,” explained an HMRC spokeswoman.

Sudden slump

June’s figures appeared to show that property sales had fallen that month to just 77,000.

That was a 45% drop from the same month last year, when 140,000 properties were sold.

This chimed closely with many other figures, which show that the market has gone through a sudden slump this year because of the credit crunch.

For instance, the most recent report from the Land Registry for England & Wales showed that sales in April were down by 39% over the previous 12 months.

The number of mortgages approved by lenders for house purchase was down by 69% in June, according to the Bank of England.

The HMRC house sales data which had been due out on Thursday will now be published on 21 September.

In May, another government agency, the Office for National Statistics (ONS), admitted publishing erroneous pension statistics.

News reported by The BBC

A last minute rush by people trying to renew their tax credit claims has made it hard to get through on the hotline run by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).

The deadline for claimants to confirm the details of their income for 2007-08 is midnight on Thursday 31 July.

Failure to do this, or renew a claim for this year means tax credits will be cancelled and overpayments reclaimed.

HMRC said the hotline is still working and anyone having trouble phoning in their claim should keep on trying.

“It’s the busiest time of year,” said an HMRC spokeswoman.

“People are still getting through and the hotline will be open until 2200 BST, but we apologise for any delays,” she added.

Complex system

More than £65bn has been paid out to millions of families since the tax credits system was set up in 2003 with the aim of lifting low-paid people, particularly those with children, out of poverty.

However, the system has been plagued by complexity, bureaucratic errors and fraud.

There have also been systematic over-payments, though not on the scale seen in earlier years.

This has led to the HMRC demanding the repayment of money that claimants thought was theirs.

As a result some families have been plunged into financial hardship, which has led to scathing criticism of the HMRC’s administration of the system by MPs, charities and accountancy bodies.

John Whiting, tax partner at the accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, and a member of the Low-Incomes Tax Reform Group, said bad publicity was still putting off potential claimants.

And this was the reason why more than £4bn a year was going unclaimed.

“It does take a good deal of effort to claim,” he said.

“The HMRC do try hard to help people, but they require a lot of information.

“Because it is geared to your income they need all your income details, and not just for you but for your partner,” he said.

Tax credits are currently paid to 20 million people, including 6 million families and 10 million children.

Last year just over 200,000 claims were cancelled because claimants failed to renew, though in some cases this may have been because the person knew they were no longer eligible for the money.

News reported by The BBC