Archive for December, 2008

HMRC has reissued Employer Helpbook E18 How to help your employees with childcare. The booklet provides guidance on the tax and NICs treatment of childcare facilities provided by employers, i.e. in the provision of workplace nurseries, childcare vouchers, and directly contracted childcare. It also reflects the changes to the definition of “qualifying child care” that [...]

HMRC’s decision to replace the existing A-5 size P45 with a larger A4-size form has been queried by some software developers who have been encouraging their clients to consider environmental issues and online filing. In response, HMRC makes the following points: While we accept the importance of environmental issues, we have also had to take [...]

The Department for Work and Pensions has published all of the benefit rates that will apply from 6 April 2009. As with the recently-announced tax allowance and NICs threshold increases from that date, the rates are being increased by 5%, i.e. the rate of retail inflation at September 2008. Statutory Sick Pay: From 6 April [...]

Despite an indication a year ago that the car fuel charge multiplier would be increased annually, HMRC has announced that the figure used for the calculation of the car fuel benefit charge will remain at £16,900 for the 2009/10 tax year. Also, the £500 van fuel benefit charge will not be increased for the 2009/10 [...]

HMRC questions and answers (Part 2) (Reproduced from the December 2008 issue of Notes for Payroll Software Developers. The use of “we”, “us”, “our” etc in the answers applies to HMRC.) I’ve received a P6 notice of coding for a new employee before the P46 has been sent. Do I still need to send it? [...]

By Curt Finch, CEO of Journyx, Inc. What constitutes 90% of the value in recent asset sales on Wall Street by large companies? The answer is data centers and headquarters. When Lehman Brothers went bankrupt and sold its assets to Barclays for $1.75 billion, its data centers and headquarters constituted 86% of the value. This [...]

A short newsletter for you this week, the most important item being the reduction in HMRC’s advisory fuel rates. If you have a dispensation based on these rates, you will have to reduce the amounts you pay to company car drivers in reimbursement of their business mileage by 1 January. This week’s Employer FAQ looks [...]

The Department of Trade and Industry has released a consultation document which is intended to precede new Regulations aimed at modernising aspects of existing work permit legislation. The present review is intended to ensure that the legislation, the protection afforded to Isle of Man workers and the needs of the economy are in alignment to [...]

HMRC has reissued online booklet IR115 Paying for childcare – Getting help from your employer. The booklet explains the tax relief provisions as they relate to childcare facilities provided by employers, i.e. in the provision of workplace nurseries, childcare vouchers, and directly contracted childcare. It also reflects the changes to the definition of “qualifying child [...]

The Pensions Act 2008 gained Royal Assent on 26 November 2008. The Act provides the framework for the automatic provision by employers of “pension personal accounts”, likely from 2012. The detail of these statutory obligations will be include in future Regulations. More detailed information about these coming new obligations for employers will be provided in [...]

Following its semi-annual review of fuel prices, HMRC has given one month’s notice of new advisory fuel rates that apply from 1 January 2009. However, HMRC has stated that the new rates may be applied immediately if employers are able and wish to do so. HMRC documents the way in which the rates are calculated. [...]

Last week’s newsletter was dedicated to the Pre-Budget Report, so the many items included this week look back over two weeks of announcements from government and other sources. There is, however, a little more to say about the PBR changes, so don’t miss that item. We are heavy on consultations this week. HMRC has published [...]

The Government has now published an open consultation document to gather comments and views from employers, workers and consumers, in order to obtain a picture of the relationship between the NMW and the handling of both mandatory and non-mandatory service charges, tips, gratuities and cover charges. The consultation has two objectives, first to determine the [...]

The Finance Act 2008 makes provision for HMRC to accept payment of taxes by credit card but imposes a requirement for the taxpayer to pay a fee that corresponds with the costs incurred by HMRC in handling the payment. In August 2008, new Regulations set the fee for credit card payments made by telephone at [...]

HMRC consulted on a package of proposals for its approach to payment, repayment and debt in June 2007. This resulted in legislation in the Finance Act 2008 for three of the proposals, namely, to align and modernise HMRC powers to seize and sell goods to satisfy tax debt and to take action for debt in [...]

The following statutory limits take effect where the appropriate day for the particular payment, as specified in legislation, falls on or after the first day of February in the particular year. Section 34 of the Employment Relations Act 1999 provides that these limits are increased or decreased from 1 February each year according to the [...]

In June 2008, HMRC published a consultation document that explored the circumstances in which taxpayers should become liable to civil penalties when they do not meet their obligations to submit returns and pay the tax they owe on time. New penalty regimes have already been introduced, in the 2007 and 2008 Finance Acts, for submission [...]

On 20 November, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Georgian Minister of Foreign Affairs signed an Agreement for the Avoidance of Double Taxation and the Prevention of Fiscal Evasion with Respect to Taxes on Income. Negotiations for an Agreement with Georgia took place in Tbilisi in May, 2007. The Agreement is comprehensive in scope [...]

The Low Pay Commission (LPC) is required to make recommendations for increases to the National Minimum Wage (NMW) rates for October 2009, and provisional recommendations for October 2010. In a detailed document issued to the LPC, the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) describes the various measures that have been introduced recently that [...]

We have some additional information and also some adjustments to make to the information given in last week’s newsletter on the new tax and NICs rates that come into force from 6 April 2009. The legislative change to the personal allowance (in the Income Tax (Indexation) (No. 3) Order 2008, shows an increase to £6,345. [...]