Social Security Contributions and Benefits (Northern Ireland) Act 1992

General regulation - making powers

8 (1) Regulations may provide—

(a) for requiring persons to maintain, in such form and manner as may be prescribed, records—

(i) of the earnings paid by them to and in respect of earners, and

(ii) of the contributions paid or payable in respect of earnings so paid,

for the purpose of enabling the incidence of liability for contributions of any class to be determined, and to retain the records for so long as may be prescribed;

(b) for requiring persons to maintain, in such form and manner as may be prescribed, records of such matters as may be prescribed for the purpose of enabling the incidence of liability for Class 1A contributions to be determined, and to retain the records for so long as may be prescribed;

(c) for treating primary Class 1 contributions, when payable on the primary contributor’s behalf by the secondary contributor, but not paid, as actually paid where the failure to pay is shown not to have been with the consent or connivance of, or attributable to any negligence on the part of, the primary contributor and, in the case of contributions so treated, for treating them also as paid at a prescribed time or in respect of a prescribed period;

(d) for treating, for the purpose of any entitlement to benefit, contributions paid at or after any prescribed time as paid at some other time (whether earlier or later) or, in the case of contributions paid after the due date for payment, or at such later date as may be prescribed, as not having been paid;

(e) for enabling contributions to be treated as paid in respect of a tax year earlier or later than that in respect of which they were actually paid;

(f) for treating (for the purposes of Class 2 contributions) a week which falls partly in one, and partly in another, tax year as falling wholly within one or the other of those tax years;

(g) for treating contributions of the wrong class, or at the wrong rate, or of the wrong amount, as paid on account of contributions properly payable (notwithstanding section 14 above, in the case of Class 3 contributions) or as paid (wholly or in part) in discharge of a liability for a state scheme premium;

(h) for the repayment, in prescribed cases, of the whole or a prescribed part of any contributions paid by reference to earnings which have become repayable;

(i) for the repayment, in prescribed cases, of a prescribed part of any Class 1A contribution as to which the Department is satisfied in the light of information of a kind mentioned in section 10(6)(a), (b) or (c) above that has become available to it, that too much has been paid;

(j) for the repayment, on the making of an application in the prescribed manner and within the prescribed time, of Class 2 contributions paid by a person in respect of a period which consists of, or falls within, a tax year for which his earnings from employment as a self-employed earner were, or were such as to be treated by regulations under subsection (4) of section 11 above as being, at a lower rate than the one specified in that subsection for that year;

(k) for excepting a person from liability for contributions repaid by virtue of paragraph (j) above, to the extent that he would not have been so excepted by virtue of section 11(4) above;

(l) without prejudice to paragraph (g) above, for enabling—

(i) the whole or part of any payment of secondary Class 1 contributions to be treated as a payment of Class 1A contributions;

(ii) the whole or part of any payment of Class 1A contributions to be treated as a payment of secondary Class 1 contributions or Class 2 contributions;

(iii) the whole or part of any payment of Class 2 contributions to be treated as a payment of secondary Class 1 contributions or Class 1A contributions;

(m) for the return of the whole or any prescribed part of any contributions paid either in error or in such circumstances that, under any provision of Part I of this Act or of regulations, they fall to be repaid;

(n) for treating a person as being an employed earner, notwithstanding that his employment is outside Northern Ireland;

(o) for treating a person’s employment as continuing during periods of holiday, unemployment or incapacity for work and in such other circumstances as may be prescribed;

(p) for requiring persons to apply to the Department for the allocation of a national insurance number;

(q) for any other matters incidental to the payment, collection or return of contributions.

(2) Regulations made by the Department under sub-paragraph (1) above providing for the payment of Class 2 or Class 3 contributions (at the option of the persons liable to pay) either—

(a) by means of adhesive stamps; or

(b) by some alternative method, the use of which involves greater expense in administration to the government departments concerned than would be incurred if the contributions were paid by means of such stamps,

may include provision for the payment to the Department by any person who adopts any alternative method, and for the recovery by the Department, of the prescribed fees in respect of any difference in the expense in administration.

(3) Where under regulations made by virtue of sub-paragraph (1) above contributions are payable by means of adhesive stamps, the Department—

(a) may, with the consent of the Department of Finance and Personnel, arrange for the preparation and sale of those stamps, and

(b) may by regulations provide for applying, with the necessary modifications as respects those stamps, all or any of the provisions of the [1891 c. 38.] Stamp Duties Management Act 1891, section 9 of the [1891 c. 39.] Stamp Act 1891 and section 63 of the [1953 c. 36.] Post Office Act 1953.

9 Regulations may provide that—

(a) for the purpose of determining whether a contribution is payable in respect of any person, or

(b) for determining the amount or rate of any contribution,

he is to be treated as having attained at the beginning of a week, or as not having attained until the end of a week, any age which he attains during the course of that week.