Voluntary Redundancies

As this loyal reader has correctly pointed out, HMRC's voluntary redundancies are not just confined to Northern Ireland or Wales:

"Ken the voluntary exits are all over they include Ipswich, Kings Lynn, Barnsley, Plymouth amongst many others how come you think it's just NI. You usually more on the ball than this?"


Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Welsh Voluntary Redundancies

Northern Ireland is not the only part of the UK where HMRC staff face cuts in numbers.

The BBC reports that HMRC has said that 259 staff in Wales could apply for "voluntary exit".

There are 86 positions to be cut in Carmarthen, 81 in Colwyn Bay, 84 in Merthyr Tydfil and eight in Pembroke Dock.

The rationale is the same used by HMRC as for Northern Ireland; namely:

"An increasing number of customers are choosing to do business with us through our online services, which has reduced our need for physical sites. 

This change has seen the nature of our work shift away from mass-processing work of the past to more specialist, but less labour-intensive, roles required in effective policing of the tax system."

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Research Manager, Tax Policy and Insight

The ICAEW are currently looking to recruit a research manager for tax policy:

"The objective of the role is to further the study of taxation through research and thought leadership that supports succinct leading insight and opinion on big public policy issues.  The role offers an opportunity to engage with business, firms and tax authorities across a number of jurisdictions. The role requires excellent research, communication and writing skills and preferably working knowledge and experience of tax administration and operations.

Working alongside the ICAEW public policy team, the manager will engage stakeholders to discuss and raise awareness of these issues.

They, with the Head of Faculty, will also be assigned the objective of positively re-engaging the largest firms in the work of the ICAEW Tax Faculty and develop a longer term insight agenda.  For example, researching and preparing material on key issues: advancing the thinking on the ICAEW ten tenets of a better tax system, exploring the roles and responsibilities of the parties to the tax system and articulating the issues/principles that should underpin a 21^st century tax system.

This may include examining changes in the structure, organisation and regulatory environment for tax and the market for tax services contrasting the UK and equivalent developments in other countries through contact with practitioners, academics, tax authorities, professional groupings and ICAEW international offices.

The manager will also analyse tax systems, identify common themes and approaches to tax operations as well as identifying problems and solutions which can then be made publicly available, whether by way of reports or other means of communication.

Specific duties will vary from time to time in line with the business needs."

Those interested can apply via this link ICAEW.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Newry and Londonderry Voluntary Redundancies

It is interesting that HMRC state that the rationale for the voluntary redundancies in Newry and Londonderry is the fact that "an increasing number of customers are choosing to do business with us through our online services, which has reduced our need for physical sites...", because both of these sites deal with specialist issues not specifically affected by an increased use of online services.

Specifically Londonderry houses the Appeals Reviews Unit, and Newry is the CIS centre. 

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Does Gift Aid Work?

According to the National Audit Office neither the Treasury nor HMRC know whether Gift Aid and other tax reliefs on donations have resulted in more income for charities.

HMRC has not collected the data which would enable it to conclude how tax incentives since 2000 have affected donor behaviour, or if they have increased the value of donations.

The Head of the National Audit Office, Amyas Morse, said:

"Gift Aid is an important source of income for many charities, worth £1bn to charities in 2012/13. The changes made in 2000 to increase charitable giving resulted in a further £940m of reliefs going to individuals and companies as an incentive to give more money to charity. 

However, the exchequer departments cannot demonstrate that these incentives are working, or that the increased cost to the taxpayer has resulted in a rise in donations to charity."

Unsurprisingly the NAO recommends that HMRC and HM Treasury should collect better evidence on the impact of reliefs on donor behaviour, and should work with the charitable sector and academics to obtain this.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

HMRC Voluntary Redundancies

My thanks to a loyal reader who pointed out that HMRC is looking for around 250 voluntary redundancies in four of its offices in Northern Ireland.

The number of staff eligible to apply for redundancy is 24 in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh; 77 in Londonderry; 134 in Newry, County Down, and 5 in Belfast.

HMRC told the BBC that the redundancies were necessary as more taxpayers (HMRC in fact used the "c" word) choose to do business with them online.

Quote:

"An increasing number of customers are choosing to do business with us through our online services, which has reduced our need for physical sites.

This change has seen the nature of our work shift away from the mass processing work of the past to the more specialist, but less labour-intensive, roles required in effective policing of the tax system.

As a result some areas of our work do not require as many staff.

We are not closing any offices today."

Doubtless those staff with the most experience will be the ones tempted to leave, which of course is not good news for HMRC or the taxpayers.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

HMRC Goes Digital

Mark Dearnley (HMRC's new Chief Digital Information Officer) recently told delegates at the Ignite conference that HMRC will become a "fully accessible digital business”.

He is quoted by ComputerWorldUK:

“This is not a big bang programme, we are doing this agile, in two-week sprints.”

Seemingly HMRC will become a digital public service built on agile methods, open source software and internally developed skills.

Dearnley noted that HMRC needs to reduce its operating costs by 22%.

Dearnley quoted some statistics:

“We send out 193 million letters a year and receive 20 million letters and 73 million inbound calls.

There’s a huge amount more we can do.”

Adding:

“We will aim for a single view of the customer that you will be able to log on to and view. Business and individuals will be able to have a tax account just like an online bank account.

The offer will be tailored for the most tech savvy to the least.”

Dearnley said that real time information will also enable HMRC to inform taxpayers that a submission has been received and checked.

“Self-service means you get an instant answer.” 

There will also be a change to the six monthly roll-outs:

“Today we do two roll-outs a year and the systems go down for four days a year. Instead we are going to move to frequent roll-outs that happen over-night."

Dearnley's vision is to use as much open source as possible, with his happiness being maximised by "a cloud provider certified to IL3 for open stack data.”

As ever comments and views are welcome from all. 

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Inglese Retires

My thanks to a loyal reader who pointed me to an article in The Lawyer that notes that HMRC have appointed a new general counsel to replace the retiring Anthony Inglese. Gill Aitken from the Department of Work & Pensions’ (DWP) where she is director general of legal services, will take up the role at the end of January 2014.

As an aside, in 2010 she topped the DWP bonus league by earning a £10K bonus on top of her £125K salary.

Loyal readers with long memories will recall that in November 2011 the Commons Public Accounts Committee took the unusual step of making Anthony Inglese CB, General Counsel and Solicitor HMRC, swear an oath at a PAC hearing into HMRC Accounts and Tax Disputes.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Miscommunications and ESC A19

Today's Telegraph has an interesting article about the problems that can be caused when there are communication failures (both ways) between a taxpayer and HMRC.

The article is reproduced in full below, but in essence it relates to a change in taxpayer circumstances which seems to have not been effectively communicated to HMRC, which in turn did not communicate the related increase in tax due in a timely/effective manner.

HMRC then withdrew the tax demand, once the Telegraph became involved, on the basis of ESC A19.

Here is the article in full:

"I started to work as an occupational health nurse in 2009 with the police on a short-term rolling contract finishing in late 2010. I started receiving my state pension in 2011. 
 

I then again resumed working with the same body in March 2011. Because I was employed by an agency my wages were paid to them and transferred to an accountant who deducted taxes and expenses. 
 

I was asked by the agency, when I went to work for them again, if my circumstances had changed. I informed them that I was now drawing a state pension. 
 

Two months after I finished work HMRC informed me that I had been receiving state pension and had not been taxed on it. Now, looking at my records, they said I owed for 2011-12 as well as later. I asked them why they hadn’t informed me before and they said they were short staffed and hadn’t got around to it and anyway it was my responsibility. 
 

I was quite shocked as I had been paying accountants to deal with my tax affairs.

Phoning up my accountants they said they had not received any new tax information about me from HMRC so how could they have increased the tax.

JR, Somerset

This came at a particularly difficult time as you had had to retire to look after your elderly mother who is housebound and in need of constant attention. Yet you now had to find some £3,000. You felt this was very unjust.

I spoke to HMRC and it agreed to withdraw the tax claim against you. You say HMRC has now acknowledged to you that it had on many occasions failed to inform you of the correct new tax code.
Presumably the change in the claiming of your pension had simply not been registered.

It seems you have not provided permission to HMRC to give me the full details of the whys and wherefores of this but I do understand that you have demanding caring duties.

You say this resolution comes as a huge relief.

For information about exceptional circumstances where a tax demand may be cancelled, see hmrc.gov.uk/dealingwith/esc.htm. Otherwise speak to Citizens Advice or call the tax office."

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

HMRC's Phone Racket

As per PAC's report "27th Report - Charges for customer telephone lines" published 11 November 2013, page 18:

"Q7 Chair: Okay. When we looked at HMRC, we uncovered—I think, actually, after our Report you uncovered, in further inquiries—that Cable and Wireless was making £1 million out of the telephone deal with HMRC on the use of 0845 or 0844 numbers. That’s a bit of a racket, isn’t it?"

Quite!

"Q11 Chair: Do you accept the Ofcom research in this Report, that customers are deterred from using phones because of higher charges, and that therefore that will cost the Government more because they are more likely then to visit the diminishing number of HMRC offices or the Jobcentre Plus, which will cost a lot of money?"

Page 6 sums it up nicely:

"The performance of HM Revenue and Customs is considerably worse, with an average waiting time for calls to be answered in the first quarter of 2013–1 4 of about seven minutes. Astonishingly, the Department only managed to answer 16% of the calls it received to its Tax Credits helpline on 31 July 2013, the deadline-day for notifying changes of circumstances."

As ever, comments and views are welcome from all.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

The Disadvantages of Allowing HMRC To Calculate Your Tax

Tax-News reports that the UK Supreme Court has confirmed that HMRC has the right to withhold tax relief and demand payment of a tax debt while investigating what HMRC believes to be a tax avoidance scheme.

The judgement reverses the decision of the Appeal Court in relation to the Cotter test case, in which it was argued that a taxpayer has the right to amend a tax return to carry back employment loss relief, and that HMRC had been wrong to bring collection proceedings without first allowing an appeal to the tax tribunal.

The issue rested on the jurisdictional boundary between the tax tribunal and the ordinary courts. In this instance, the claimant (Maurice Cotter) had allowed HMRC to calculate his tax owed for 2007-08, and his claim for loss relief took the form of an amendment to his tax return for that year submitted in January 2009 in which he referred to losses incurred in 2008-09.

The judges reasoned that a claim for relief in respect of losses incurred in 2008-09 did not alter the tax chargeable or payable in relation to 2007-08, and that therefore the county court and the High Court had jurisdiction rather than the tax tribunal. This was because the taxpayer was not appealing against a tax assessment in respect to a particular year, but, rather, whether losses incurred in 2008-09 constituted a defence against HMRC's claim for immediate payment in relation to tax it had calculated as owed in relation to 2007-08.

Further, a provision in the Taxes Management Act by which relief can be given while a tax inquiry is underway (Section 9A) did not apply because the claimant had allowed HMRC to calculate the amount of tax owed and his amendment was not relevant to the calculation of tax for that year. This meant that the amendment was not itself part of the "return," as defined in the provision.

The ruling means that the taxpayer must perform a calculation of the amount of tax due him/herself, rather than leave that calculation to HMRC, in order to retain possession of funds under dispute.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

HMRC Unjustly Enriched

Citywire reports that thousands of Prudential with-profits investors could be in line to receive a share of around £150M after a High Court judge ruled that HMRC had unfairly taxed ‘several thousand dividends’ between 1990 and 2009.

Quite remarkably this case has been running for 10 years, and might affect other providers of similar with-profits funds eg; Aviva, Royal Sun Alliance, Standard Life and Legal & General.

Mr Justice Henderson ruled that HMRC had unfairly taxed the funds in question, and should reimburse Prudential policyholders the tax paid with compound interest.

The judgement read:

‘The Revenue remains unjustly enriched until the date of actual repayment… the interest forms part of the restitutionary claim itself. I would reject the Revenue’s submission that the claimants’ only entitlement is to simple interest...compound interest forms part of the principal sum that needs to be awarded in order to achieve full restitution.’

The ruling is open to appeal by HMRC, which said it was considering the judgement ‘carefully’ before deciding whether to appeal.

Thus it may well continue to run for several more years!

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

Chris Mortlock To Leave HMRC

My thanks to a loyal reader who penned me a line over the weekend about the impending departure of Chris Mortlock Head of Operations & Security - IMS Live Services at HMRC (as per LinkedIn).

As per Agile Across The Board:

"As Head of IT Solutions Development and Operations at HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) Chris is accountable for: the update, development and operational running of systems and services that collect in excess of £130bn a year for the UK; and the provision of systems and services to UK Border Force and law enforcement communities that help protect the UK. Chris is currently leading the development teams that are enabling HMRC to deliver a step change in its digital service offering through the development of digital services using agile methodologies.

Previously, Chris held the position of Deputy Director of Security & Risk at HMRC, where he was responsible for the transformation of the IT security processes and systems after the Poynter Review."

Subject to confirmation he will depart for CSC (a provider of consulting and IT services to many of the UK’s leading organisations) on 20th December 2013.

CSC states the following:

"Many of our clients are responsible for the country’s infrastructure and security – including the UK Border Agency (UKBA), National Grid, Network Rail, and Transport for London, Royal Mail Group and the NHS – and they use technology powered by CSC."

Interestingly one of its clients is Aviva, which Phil Pavitt joined in January this year as did Mark Hall in October.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

A Reader Asks

A loyal reader has asked me to ask others on this site if there are any forums or support groups for former clients of Christopher Lunn?

Thanks.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

RTI Little More Than an Extra Click of a Button

Mark Paraskeva, CEO of SME Division at IRIS Software Group, assesses how businesses are coping with the introduction of RTI six months on (source ComputerWeekly.com):

"It has now been six months since the introduction of Real Time Information, but it seems that many small businesses are still having issues complying with the new legislation. Regardless of your opinion of RTI, it is here to stay so you need ensure your business is compliant.

In a recent announcement, HMRC revealed that 83% of small to medium sized businesses are successfully making RTI submissions, and approximately 44.5 million payments made between 6 April and 5 May were successfully reported in real time.

However, it has also been revealed that up to 600,000 PAYE schemes are still not complying with RTI. HMRC has already started contacting these non-compliant schemes with the possibility of penalties if they fail to achieve compliance.

Many businesses have reported problems when trying to file submissions using HMRC's free online PAYE tool. Some businesses have been unable to make submissions due to gateway downtime and other unspecified issues with the software.

As well as these issues, feedback we have received is that since HMRC updated the tool earlier this year, the system requirements have been increased, rendering many employer's computers incapable of running it. After the update the minimum requirements for HMRC's tool are:

•    Intel 2.8GHz processor
•    1GB RAM
•    500 MB available hard disk space

Some employers whose computers do meet the minimum requirements have still found that the software is not running smoothly on their systems.

If you have been having issues with HMRC's free tool, there are other options available. Some commercial payroll software providers have free RTI compliant software. However, these are aimed at smaller businesses with fewer than 10 employees and are only designed to handle a basic payroll.

Employers with more complex infrastructures or more than 10 employees could be better off looking at paid for options. When choosing a software supplier it is important to look at exactly what you will be getting. Choosing a provider who also offers support can be a huge advantage, especially with complex legislative changes such as RTI and automatic enrolment. If you can, it is a good idea to look for a provider who offers a "complete solution".

On top of paid for training, certain suppliers have also been offering free online introduction courses, whitepapers, advice lines and "health checks" to asses company's specific needs.

Looking past a few initial teething problems, it seems that the worst of RTI is behind us. Feedback we have received has told us that once you have your software in place and your data has been input correctly, complying with the legislation is little more than an extra click of a button."

Fair assessment?

As ever, views and comments from both RTI end users and HMRC staff are very welcome.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

HMRC Staff Quit In Large Numbers

The FT reports that HMRC staff are quitting in their highest numbers for four years.

A total of 1,697 staff left in 2012-13, the largest figure since 2008-09.

HMRC appear to be relaxed about this an HMRC spokesman said:

“This has not affected performance – the most accurate measure of the tax gap shows it is going down, last year’s yield was our biggest ever, and we carried out over 700 prosecutions.

The popularity of our online services has enabled us to move staff away from the mass processing work of the past into more specialised and skilled work of tackling evasion and avoidance."

Is it not those with many years of experience etc that are the ones who are leaving?

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

Insurance to protect you against the cost of enquiry or dispute with HMRC is available from several sources including Solar Tax Investigation Insurance.

Ken Frost has negotiated a 10% discount on any polices that may suit your needs.

However, neither Ken Frost nor HMRCISSHITE either endorses or recommends their services.

What is Solar Tax Investigation Insurance?

Solar Tax Investigation Insurance is a tax-fee protection service that will pay up to £75,000 towards your accountant's fees in the event of an HM Revenue & Customs full enquiry or dispute.

To find out more, please use this link Solar Tax Investigation Insurance



HMRC Is Shite (www.hmrcisshite.com), also available via the domain www.hmrconline.com, is brought to you by www.kenfrost.com "The Living Brand"

A Reminder To Politicians - Don't Count Your Chickens

HMRC can only collect what is legally due.

HMRC's Edward Troup was quoted by the Telegraph:

"Our job is to collect tax [and we follow] the law as it stands." 

Oh, and re the same article, in July I wrote:

"The trouble with the ongoing politicisation of tax (or rather the mechanisms involved in collecting tax) is that the politicians and media "professionals" involved in the spin are apt to "overspin" the issues and potential results etc.

Such appears to be the case with the "landmark" tax agreement between the UK and Switzerland, which Osborne heralded last year as:

"The largest tax evasion settlement in British history."

Fast forward to the present day and we see...cough... that it now looks set to raise much less revenue than expected, according to an update from the Swiss Bankers Association (SBA).
Osborne expected to raise £5BN over five years, of which £3.2BN of revenues expected this year have already been included in the government’s borrowing figures."

It seems that the reality will be around £440M this year and £782M, in total, since an agreement was signed.

Tax does have to be taxing.

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