Archive for August, 2011

The First-tier Tax Tribunal suggests that HMRC is acting like a “disreputable debt collector” and uses the penalty system as a “cash generating scheme”… We thought the Tax tribunal comments that we reported last week would be enough to force HMRC to change its policy towards year-end filing penalties.  But another decision goes further and [...]

HMRC’s former bank account details are no longer valid – are you using the current details? Early in 2009 HMRC announced that it was changing its bankers from the Bank of England to Citi and Royal Bank of Scotland Group and that new sort codes and accounts numbers were being introduced in April 2009. The [...]

The Pensions Regulator has released four interactive tools to help smaller businesses begin preparing for automatic enrolment. The Pensions Regulator is the UK regulator of work-based pension schemes and, in addition to protecting the interests of scheme members, it has statutory responsibility for maximising employer compliance with their duties in connection with auto-enrolment from 2012. [...]

Concerned at the amount of work involved in responding to employer and agent requests for detailed records of an employer’s payments to the Accounts Office, HMRC has introduced a new procedure. The following is an extract from the latest weekly informal update (dated 29 July) from HMRC to employer representatives. We told you in April’s [...]

HMRC has started to send out Tax Calculations for the 2010/11 tax year. The annual process of issuing P800 Tax Calculations to taxpayers who have either overpaid or underpaid tax during the 2010/11 tax year began in July.  HMRC is issuing Calculations for overpaid tax initially and those for taxpayers who have underpaid tax will [...]

HMRC proposes a different method to counter prevent continuing exploitation of the provisions of DTAs. The UK has some 120 bilateral double taxation agreements (DTAs) with other countries, the purpose of which is the avoidance of double taxation, i.e. situations where tax liabilities on the same payments in both countries, and the prevention of fiscal [...]

HMRC provides guidance on the VAT implications of the CJEU decision in the Astra Zeneca flexible benefits case. [VAT terminology: “input tax” is the amount of VAT paid when goods or services are purchased. “output tax” is the amount of VAT charged when goods are sold or services provided.] In a decision given on 29 [...]

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? Non Executive Directors and Expenses Hi,Could you please clarify the rules regarding Non executive directors (NED’s) and the receipt of expenses, in particular mileage and hotel accomodation. Should these payments attract [...]