Archive for May, 2011

“I want you to look after some visitors” is one of those dreaded instructions that bosses from time to time give you with a smile, believing that you will be overjoyed to get a bit of new company when in fact you will resent the whole experience. True, visitors can be an awful nuisance since [...]

Last month we posed the following question: What is the oldest man-made device to break the sound barrier? The answer is – a whip. What we call the “crack of the whip” is the end of the whip travelling so fast that it breaks the sound barrier. There. A bit of science for you. Now [...]

A pleasantly quiet week with, seemingly, most of the Government departments taking long holidays.  But, so you have something to read, we have included an updated version of one of our favourite Employer FAQs about salaried employees and the National Minimum Wage.  So, think about the salaried staff in your business, the number of hours [...]

I have always thought that HMRC takes an unreasonably hard line to taxpayer “excuses” for not being able to file their return or make their payment on time.  Now, a tribunal judge has clearly said so, at least in the specific circumstances of the cases in question.  Whether or not HMRC appeals the decisions, the [...]

If a taxpayer does not know what is required, in what circumstances can that be a “reasonable excuse”? In two decisions given in April 2011, the First-tier Tax Tribunal refused to accept HMRC’s interpretation of what is a “reasonable excuse”, in one case emphasising the need for employers to make it clear to leavers that [...]

Developer technical specifications provide first real glimpse of the Real Time Information process The first draft of the system specifications for Real Time Information (RTI) was issued to payroll software developers on 26 April, about eleven months before the first full pilot is due to start with selected developers and volunteer employers. The documents are [...]

Each week we receive a number of payroll questions on our forum, and here are this week’s batch. Can you help with any answers? P11D new starter We had an employee join us on 28 March 2011 who has been given a company car, as they were recruited after the March payroll had run they [...]