Joint Assessment vs Single Asssessment

mactheknife19

This topic confuses the hell out of me. Currently I think my wife and I are under Joint Assessment with out tax credits split equally. I vaguely remember doing this when we got married 10 years ago. I've registered for PAYE Anytime today so I can check that as soon as I get the PIN.
In the interim some of the more clever among you could maybe advise me.

Situation
I earn €47k, wife earns €96( €80k basic, €12k car allowance, and maybe out €4k in bonuses.)

Q1 - So assuming we are joint assess and 50/50 split on the tax credits are we doing what is best for us. Is there any benefit in going back to single assessment or changing the split in credits.

Q2 - wife will go on maternity leave next March. And will have 4 months maternity leave pay and unpaid until the end of 2013. So in total for 2013 will early 7/12's of her salary, so approx 56k. Is there any tax benefit to be gained by changing any assessment method.

Q3 - Maybe the most important question. Wife returns to work in Jan 2014. We will have a childcare bill of approx €2k. After tax I take home approx €2600 so if I was to stay at home and mind the kids we would save the €2k, and be down €600 pm in real terms. But because I would be not working 2014 and 2015 is there something that I could do with my tax credits to offset that to some extent. Can I transfer some of my tax credits. If that is something that can be done, do anyone have a rough estimate on how much it would be.

namenotavailablE

You could try running these scenarios through my Excel spreadsheet. A link to it is in my signature (although if clicking it doesn't bring you to the site try copying & pasting the address directly into your browser- sometimes there's a problem going there from Boards.ie, apparently).
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