Dedicated to the taxpayers of Britain, and the employees of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC), who have to endure the monumental shambles that is HMRC.
A number of loyal readers have commented on the word "lately" re Homer's Damehood:
"Order of the Bath Dames Commander of the Order of the Bath Ms Linda Margaret HOMER, CB Lately Chief Executive, HM Revenue and Customs. For public service particularly to Public Finance. (Hadleigh, Suffolk)."
Does this mean she has already left office?
If so, why has there been no advert for the job yet?
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.
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.
Another New Year approaches, and with it another set of New Year honours.
Normally the honours attract a degree of admiration and ridicule, depending on who has been awarded one and on the political perspective of those viewing the honours list.
However, this year marks a turning point in which the entire country has been royally taken the piss out of by the award of a Damehood to Lin Homer.
Homer's "career" (if it can be described as such) is a series of increasingly appalling car crashes of spectacular incompetence, as she climbs the slippery slope of civil service power and authority. Now, to add insult to injury, she has been awarded a Damehood for her work in HMRC.
This surely is an insult to every member of staff of HMRC and every taxpayer; ie it is an insult to the entire country.
Normally honours are awarded to those who have left office, to those who have done something useful or to those who are chums with the PM. However, as far as I can see, Homer is none of these.
Therefore I can only conclude that she was given the award for one (or a combination) of the following reasons:
1 Cameron is a closet republican, and wants to bring the system into such disrepute that it is abolished.
2 Cameron wants to take people's attention away from Crosby's honour.
3 Homer was about to leave, and the award is a bribe to keep her in office long enough so that she can be blamed when HMRC inevitably collapses.
4 Homer knows where the bodies are buried in HMRC, and it's a bribe to keep her quiet.
Whatever the reason, it's a fucking disgrace!
Thoughts and comments are very much appreciated.
Incidentally, a twitter chum of mine who is a journalist is seeking confirmation (for an article that he is penning) that Homer is on PAYE. I assume that she is, but please could someone confirm this?
Thanks.
Happy New Year!
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.
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.
Despite the ongoing chaos in the North of the country caused by storms Desmond, Eva and Frank, HMRC are emulating the response of Sir Philip Dilley (chairman of the Environment Agency) and not giving a damn.
"Stuart Jones of 3CA Accountants in Kendal, Cumbria has borne the
brunt of the twin storms’ fury. According to Jones, residents are
bracing themselves for further storms. Kendal was completely cut off
three days ago as all the roads leading into the town were flooded.
Jones
now has the unenviable task of facing self assessment season with a
ruined office. “Our downstairs was about a metre deep,” said Jones.
“We’ve had to move upstairs and we’ve lost all our computers and records.” HMRC has set up a flooding tax helpline -
but Jones told AccountingWEB he has struggled to get conclusive answers
on precisely what allowances will be made for accountants in his
position. “When I phoned the helpline, I was told they couldn’t help me
with any client who didn’t owe HMRC money.
“They seem to expect me
to write in for every individual client to ask for reasonable excuse - I
have 80 returns to file,” he said. “And I bet if I did do that, I’d be
told to write in - but HMRC’s response turnaround is 12 weeks.”
He
continued, “Their main concern seems to be they don’t want to be seen
chasing debts from businesses who are literally up to their necks in
water. The rest of us just have to hold on,” said Jones."
This sounds par for the course for HMRC. Please feel free to share your HMRC flood stories.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Congratulations to HMRC for coming almost bottom in the 2015 Civil Service People Survey wrt staff engagement as published 16 November (yes, I know I'm late with this!).
The median employee engagement index was 58%, HMRC scored 45% (only three other departments scored lower).
Bonuses all round then eh?
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.
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.
"Jessica Figueras, chief analyst at government IT experts Kable,
believes the additional £1.3bn promised to digitise HMRC by 2020 is
money that has been costed from the Aspire contract. "HMRC is planning to save 25 per cent of the costs of
Aspire by replacing it," she said. Last year HMRC spent £874m on IT and
digital. "Put it another way – HMRC's stated plan is to spend less on
digital and IT, not more."
Let's see where we are in a year's time!
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.
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.
HMRC has today launched its digital accounts for personal taxpayers, and set
out details of its “transformative” plans to use technology to cut
costs and improve taxpayer service.
On the assumption that nothing goes wrong, HMRC believes that every individual and small business would have access to their own secure digital tax account next year.
HMRC's "brave" step towards a digital future will theoretically pave the way for the automatic uploading
of the information needed by HMRC leading to what it described as “the
end of the tax return for millions of taxpayers”.
During 2016, information on bank and building
society interest will start to be included in tax codes, removing the
need for many taxpayers to report this income separately in a tax return.
The new personal tax accounts are aimed at providing a joined-up view
of individuals’ tax and benefits, allowing them to update their tax
details as needed and making it easier to contact HMRC officials through
services like web chat.
David Gauke, financial secretary to the Treasury, said the new
accounts were part of a digital transformation aimed at making the tax
system more effective, more efficient and easier for taxpayers.
“Giving customers the ability to manage their tax affairs
online is our latest step towards a fully digital tax system. This
government is determined to revolutionise how we deliver public services
and the tax system is no exception.”
Well then, let us see how this pans out in reality shall we?
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.
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.
Despite warnings, the
government will go ahead with plans to consult on legislation that will
create a new criminal offence for corporations that fail to take
appropriate steps to prevent the facilitation of tax avoidance.
Pinsent Masons, the law firm, notes that the new law will be difficult to impose against overseas firms. Jason Collins, partner and head of tax at Pinsent Masons, is quoted by economia warning of the dangers of trial by press release:
“You can’t extradite a company.
HMRC may resort to 'prosecution by press release' – i.e., by issuing
criminal proceedings which, because they are in the public domain, will
mean the foreign company has to decide whether to respond in the public
domain.
This is the sort of legislation of which US law-makers would be
proud. It is a bold attempt by the UK to extend the arm of its law
beyond its borders. It needs to be matched with resources to police the
offence otherwise it will become a damp squib.”
The government has also published further details on new powers that will
allow HMRC to levy penalties on companies that persistently
engage in aggressive tax planning.
A large business can be placed under what HMRC describes as “special
measures” if it judges it to have an ongoing history of tax planning.
HMRC’s “special measures” could then be used to impose harsher penalties
if any unpaid tax is due to a “speculative interpretation” of UK law.
Pinsent Masons are of the view that HMRC is free to decide what this “speculative interpretation” is. Heather Self, partner at Pinsent
Masons said:
“The new terms effectively leave HMRC as judge, jury and executioner
on these businesses’ approach to tax.
That is a very subjective judgement and is likely to result in some very contentious penalties when it is used.”
Handing more powers to HMRC, given its track record of mistakes and abusing its current powers, is not step in the right direction.
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.
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.
My thanks to a Loyal Reader who pointed out that Money Mail is looking for votes for their Wooden Spoon Award, which HMRC has featured in for six years running.
No Wooden Spoon contest is complete without the taxman gracing the list. Incredibly, this is the sixth year in a row that HM Revenue & Customs has featured. Will it ever get its act together?
The introduction this year of the new marriage tax allowance was shambolic. Problems with the application process triggered a flood of furious letters to our postbag.
In most cases, you’d been unable to get the tax break because you couldn’t pass the online test
to prove your identity. Some of you wrote to complain, but didn’t get a response for months.
To qualify, older applicants were asked for credit card, mortgage, passport or driving licence details. This froze out those who have paid off their mortgage, don’t borrow, have only a paper driving licence or no longer go abroad.
The usual problems were also prevalent: callers have also been kept on the line for nearly an hour to speak to an adviser; readers told how separate departments failed to pass on information to each other; and families were unexpectedly hit with massive bills.
In particular, millions of elderly taxpayers keep being told that they owe thousands of pounds — but can’t get an explanation as to why. Worse, their appeal is often thrown out by officials. Only when their dispute goes to the Adjudicator, the tax watchdog, is it finally upheld. For many of those forced to fight HMRC, the most troubling aspect is that despite not putting a foot wrong, they’re held accountable for a tax mistake they haven’t even made.
A spokesperson for HMRC says: ‘Our service levels have not been good enough at busy periods this year, and improvements to our service have taken longer than we’d hoped. We have taken major steps to improve, including the recruitment of 3,000 new staff into customer service roles.’
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.
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.
HMRC's recent boast in an advert in the Sunday Times, in which it states that more than 90
countries and jurisdictions that are set to commence the sharing of
financial information on UK taxpayers, has been called into question by tax professionals.
Doubts have been raised over whether HMRC
can readily handle, and make use of, the information garnered through the
arrangements.
Nigel May, a senior tax partner at MHA MacIntyre Hudson, is quoted by AccoutancyAge:
"Campaigns like this are all well and good but questions remain over the
ability of HMRC to use the information they gain from this high profile
action.
We have found that similar previous advertising tended to flush
out taxpayers who had in fact fully complied and were just terrified by
the inherent underlying threat. And we also know of other instances of cases where there was
undeclared tax due of under £100 which would undoubtedly have cost the
revenue more in administration costs than the small sum they received."
Time will tell as to whether HMRC's boasts reflect reality.
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.
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.
As per AccountingWeb, HMRC has announced a focus on the assets of strippers, escort
agencies and lap dancing clubs, with the creation of a new ‘adult
entertainment’ taskforce.
HMRC agents will be going undercover into strip clubs etc.
It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it!
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.
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.
HMRC has selected Bain & Company
to guide its transition away from its £10.7 billion Aspire IT
outsourcing contract. Bain beat eight other
bids for the £20 million contract.
In order to try to gain more control over its IT infrastructure,
and end the excessive profit making, the HMRC is exploring ways to
change the way in which its IT operations are managed.
Consultancy.uk reports that Bain & Company was
chosen on the back of its strategic IT expertise (85%) and price (15%),
and the move will see the consultancy become HMRC’s main transformation
advisory partner.
Bain’s new role will be to provide
strategic support to the HMRC, helping the “programme management team
exit from a large-scale outsourced IT arrangement” according to the
tender document.
The consultants will among others be responsible for IT
strategy advisory, programme management and governance, system process
re-engineering, supporting the people and culture change workstream, and
providing further functional/industry expertise as required.
The
contract with Bain formally started in September of this year and runs
until August 2017, thus sometime after the Aspire contract comes to an
end.
Let's see how this goes then.
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.
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.
Ever wondered why it takes HMRC so long to answer a letter?
A loyal reader yesterday summed up the reasons for the ever slower response times:
"HMRC announced that they were going to start scanning all incoming post
so they closed all the Regional Post Rooms (including Shipley which has
the mysterious BX5 postcode).
What they didnt tell Shipley was
that Shipley would become the postroom for the whole of HMRC until the
digitalisation programme was complete.
And therein lies the
problem, Shipley is running on a skeleton staff and are struggling to
cope with the volumes of post coming in and there are delays in
distributing post to the network.
I dont blame the staff, they are doing their best - its EXCOM I blame."
Response times are, if I am right, around 8 weeks or more?
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.
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.
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.
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.
Proving once again that there is a world of difference between what the government says and does, Osborne's actions wrt quarterly tax returns show he has no interest in reducing the regulatory burdens on the self employed and SME's
Osborne announced last Wednesday that tax returns will have to be filed four times a year from 2020 using apps and the HMRC website.
All very well and dandy, if it cost the taxpayers nothing in terms of time and money to quadruple their tax submissions and if ambitious HMRC IT projects actually worked.
John Longworth, director-general of the British Chambers of Commerce, is quoted by the Mail on Sunday:
"‘It’s difficult enough for businesses to deal with HMRC as it is without removing any of their face-to-face or telephone contact. Having digital might end up being a complete mess. We’re going to have to watch it very carefully."
Simon Baylis, partner at accountancy firm Moore Stephens, is just as scathing:
"You just know what’s going to happen if the self-employed are required to make quarterly payments. Many struggle to do self-assessment once a year. There will be a huge penalty issue, with disputes over people being on holiday at the end of a quarter or being sick. It will be an absolute dog’s dinner and I am very worried about it.
We haven’t got the detail yet and 2020 may seem a long way off but more and more businesses are going to be lobbying the Government over this. The Government is not thinking about the real world. In an ideal world, of course, it would be good, but in practice the self-employed and landlords are not bookkeepers.
It is ironic as quarterly reporting by FTSE 100 companies to their shareholders has just been dropped as being too burdensome."
My humble questions are as follows:
1 How can this save taxpayers, and indeed HMRC, time and money if the number of submissions is quadrupled?
2 How does reporting your tax affairs four times every year make any difference to the reality of an individual's or SME's tax position?
We have ended up but vassals of the State's bureaucracy!
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
A brief summary of the key points of Osborne's 2015 Autumn Statement has been published in the Telegraph.
Much rest on HMRC's brave new digital future, and us lowly taxpayers being given our own digital tax accounts.
What could possibly go wrong?
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.
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.
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.
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.
The award recognises the progress HMRC has made in its ongoing digital
transformation.
Specifically, the award recognises the Multi-Channel
Digital Tax Platform. MDTP gives HMRC the agility and speed required
by a digital-first organisation, while fully meeting requirements
around legacy systems and security policies.
MDTP’s microservice architecture enables multiple agile teams to rapidly
build, deploy and operate services, with enhancements going live almost
daily.
Mark Dearnley, Chief Digital and Information Officer at
HMRC, is quoted by Business Wire:
“The Tax Platform is the foundation on which the Department’s
digital future is being built. We can now deliver new services in just
weeks not months, and make changes in hours not weeks.
When people talk
about inspirational use of technology, this is the kind of project they
mean.”
Ryan Sikorsky, co-founder and Director at Equal Experts, said
“It's
wonderful to have our work recognised by judges at the UK IT Industry
awards. It’s testimony to the power of our collaborative approach –
we’re proud to have helped HMRC become a more open, digitally capable
organisation, one with a strong focus on the needs of the public.”
Well then it seems that, on the IT side at least, HMRC is a success story!
Comments anyone?
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.
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.
HMRC will be sending out approximately 2.2 million letters, between 2nd and 11th of December, to those people that it has identified as being Scottish.
However, for reasons best known to HMRC, the letters will contain no reply address or phone number.
"Following on from the announcement that the Scottish Rate of Income Tax
(SRIT) will be made public as part of the Scottish parliament budget on
16th December, HMRC have informed stakeholders what their timetable of
comms will be.
A letter will be sent to the 2.2m taxpayers that HMRC
have identified as Scottish between 2nd and 11th December. The letter
will confirm that based on their records they have identified the person
as a Scottish taxpayer subject to SRIT from 6th April 2016 and that the
rate will be announced on 16th.
Where the taxpayer feels that the
address detail is wrong their only suggested solution is to complete the
change of circumstances form
on the HMRC website.
The letter contains no reply address and,
unsurprisingly after recent events, no phone number. It will be
interesting to see if these letters lead to increased employer or agent
contact from employees who believe them to be incorrect."
Good luck to the 2.2 million who receive these letters!
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.
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.
HMRC's ten year plan to cut £100M in costs and move remaining staff to 13 hubs will not, unsurprisingly, suit every member of staff.
As such HMRC has come up with a "brilliant" solution, designed to "help" those staff who feel that (or whom HMRC feels) they are not part of HMRC's bright new digital future.
Transitional Centres
A name more akin to something built for refugees fleeing a war zone.
Computing reports that HMRC will have transitional centres for people who are likely to leave
the organisation within the next decade.
The question is which sites will be transitional?
Employees who find themselves in such a centre will doubtless feel a tad "demoralised".
Won't this cause more problems?
Notwithstanding this, HMRC plans to move certain roles and perhaps even
teams to transitional centres where they will work until the department
deems them obsolete.
What could possibly go wrong?
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.
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.
In March 2014 I wrote about HMRC's performance evaluation system, which insists on fixed quotas wherein 10% of staff fall in the bottom rating regardless of their performance.
I noted at the time that:
"This is not a new concept, many "successful" private sector companies
have used this technique (or variations thereon) eg Enron and Arthur
Andersen (the failed accountancy firm that audited Enron). Seemingly the
fear of "failure" is meant to be "motivational"."
Aside from the nonsense of having fixed quotas for staff performance,
its "success" or otherwise rests on the quality of management who make
the assessment and then "guide" those who are in the bottom 10%.
My thanks to a loyal reader, who recently dropped me a note outlining the reality of what goes on behind the scenes when HMRC management decide who has to be placed in the bottom 10%.
"Morale has eroded at an
alarming rate.
The competency based promotion system is flawed beyond
belief and as for the Performance Management Review process we have to
endure, well it is the most unfair ridiculous annual assessment of staff
I have ever known, and I've been around a while.
If the taxpayer was
aware of how many man/woman hours is wasted on this process there'd be a
public inquiry.
I kid you not.
Let me give you an example of how it
works. I meet with each member of staff under my management, once at the
mid year and once at year end. We will discuss performance and we will
agree (or not!) where that person sits within one of the three areas;
- Exceeded Performance, - Achieved Performance or - Less Effective
Performance.
As managers we have been told that as an office we MUST
have 10% of staff in the Less Effective box. This is non negotiable.
However once I've completed my staff reviews and given each one an
indicative mark I must now attend a Validation Group where all managers
meet under the leadership of a chairperson. This is where my staff will
be compared against the staff of other managers. Each manager goes in
determined that none of their staff are going to end up in the 10%
bracket. Added in to the mix is the fact that a lot of the staff being "Validated" don't even do the same type of work!!
In effect if your
manager is going in to these validation meetings you had better hope and
pray that they are exceptional at standing their ground. A further twist
here is that the validation group chair in at least one example that I
know of started the session by saying that his PMR depended on making
sure that the validation group reached the target of at least 10% of the
staff being discussed ending up in the Less Effective Performance band.
The result of all this is that decisions about individuals'
performance is being assessed by a group of managers most of whom have
never seen the work of that individual, in a lot of cases don't know
them at all.
What normally happens it that no one enters the room
with anyone in the 10% box. Then the fun and games start as each manager
listens intently for any sign of weakness in other managers arguments
or in the evidence put before them regarding each individual being
discussed.
Once a weak manager or weak evidence is identified, everyone
else turns on that individual or their manager. After all, a group
attack is the best form of defence. Weak managers are consumed by the
rest and their staff suffer as a consequence.
Oh by way, there is
supposed to be an independent note taker at each validation meeting. I
know of one independent person who was so upset at what she was exposed
to she refused to do it again.
The PMR process means that in October
and April staff are more concerned with their PMRs than about the job
they are paid to do. Perhaps someone should do a survey of HMRC call
centres at PMR time. I would guess the waiting time for customers is a
lot longer than normal. I would estimate that all staff spend a minimum
of one whole day preparing for their mid year and end of year PMR (that's a conservative estimate).
Then you've got the reviews
themselves, then you've got the validation groups, then you've got the
inevitable appeal processes.
The managers hate it, but Excom ram it down
our throats; grumble about it and you could find yourself on the
naughty step i.e. the Less Effective Box."
HMRC's performance appraisal system is clearly not fit for purpose!
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.
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.
A spokesman for HMRC is quoted by International Adviser, talking about the closure of HMRC offices and HMRC's "improved" performance:
“We recognise our customer service has not been good enough recently
and apologise to all those who have found it difficult to talk to us.
We
have gripped this issue and recruited around 3,000 new staff in our
customer teams, also moving an extra 900 HMRC people on to customer
correspondence in recent months.
These improvements have started to make a difference. This month, we
have answered more than 80% of calls, and average queue times are now
around 10 minutes.”
Well that's all very fine and dandy, except that it's bollocks.
The reality is, as a loyal reader pointed out to me, that of course performance has improved in November that's because November and December are quiet months.
Wait until January, then we will see how HMRC copes!
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.
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.
Director of personal tax, Dorothy Brown, is quoted by The Star saying that HMRC would do as much as possible to keep staff.
“We want to retain as many staff as possible which is why
we have given people five or six years’ notice so they have time to look
at their choices and options.
We fully appreciate the move might be difficult in certain personal
circumstances but we will work with staff on retaining or upskilling
them.
If people do want to travel we will support them, perhaps
helping out with travel costs if it is more expensive and we will put
together a series of HR packages. We are committed to keep as many staff
as possible.”
I doubt that!
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.
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.
Those who wish to build new HMRC offices, I would have thought that there must be some offices already built that would be suitable, feel free to apply.
Strategic Delivery Partner
HMRC
Open opportunity - This means
that the contract is currently unfulfilled but active, and the buying
department is looking for potential suppliers to contact them with bid
applications.
Closing date: 01 January 2016
Contract summary
Industry
Construction and Real Estate, Printing and Publishing, Other Services
Location of contract
M60 9LA
Value of contract (£)
£1
Published date
12 October 2015
Closing date
01 January 2016
Contract start date
01 January 2016
Contract end date
02 January 2016
Description
The purpose of this Prior Information Notice (PIN) is:
(a) to give potential tenderers advance notice that HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) currently intend to undertake a tendering exercise for a Strategic Delivery Partner, further details of which are given below, and
(b) to advise potential tenderers of an upcoming Supplier Event which will be held on 26/10/2015 in London, at 11am. Followed by opportunities to meet with HMRC on a one to one basis, to be arranged on the supplier day.
HMRC has set out its vision for its future office network as part of its Building our Future Programme. HMRC will create 14 Regional Centres across the UK, of which the majority are expected to be new build properties.
These will vary in size from 1,200 to 7,500 staff. Migration is expected to be over 5 years. The existing 170 offices will close as new Regional Centres open. There will be a small number of specialist sites in addition to the Regional Centres. Some Regional Centres may form part of larger Government Hub campuses.
The requirement is for a Strategic Delivery Partner with the experience to develop and deliver the HMRC Building our Future Property Programme. The partner will work with HMRC and advise on, develop and deliver an overall integrated Building our Future Programme, comment and evaluate individual developments within it; creating a long term management regime and occupier strategy.
HMRC is seeking to engage with organisations or consortia who might be interested in working with the Department to develop its requirements and procurement strategy.
Services to be delivered may include:
General
Programme and Project Management
Governance
Project Management Office
Communications, Marketing and Publicity
Property
Property/Asset Management
Property Acquisitions
Freehold/Leasehold Appraisal
Construction & Fit Out
Financial
Business Case Development
Financial Appraisal/Cost Modelling
Benefit Realisation
Investment Funding
Commercial
Procurement
Supply Chain Management
Technical
M&E Standards
Technical Standards (including Environmental)
Interior Design
IT Cabling Infrastructure
Supplier Knowledge & Attributes:
UK Coverage
Multi-disciplinary organisation
FM & Construction Expertise
Commercial acumen
Public Sector Procurement
Government Soft Landings
Logistical & Staff Migration Planning
Further details about the requirement will be available at the Supplier Event.
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.
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.
