HMRC Interest Rates for Late Payments To Be Revised

 

The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee announced on 2 February 2023 to increase the Bank of England base rate to 4% from 3.5%.

HMRC interest rates are linked to the Bank of England base rate.

As a consequence of the change in the base rate, HMRC interest rates for late payment and repayment will increase.

These changes will come into effect on:

• 13 February 2023 for quarterly instalment payments
• 21 February 2023 for non-quarterly instalments payments

Information on the interest rates for payments will be updated shortly.

Tax does have to be taxing.

Tax Investigation Insurance

Market leading tax fee protection insurance for businesses, sole traders and individuals. Protect yourself from accountancy fees in the event of an HMRC enquiry.

Having a Solar Protect Tax Investigation Insurance policy at your disposal means that should you be one of the many 1000's of businesses or individuals that are selected by HMRC each year to look into your tax affairs your own accountant (your tax return agent) can get on and defend you robustly.

You have the peace of mind knowing that your accountant's (your tax return agent) fees will be paid by the insurance without any Excess for you to find.

Tax Investigation Insurance is an insurance policy that will fully reimburse your accountant's (your tax return agent) fees up to £100,000 if you are subject to enquiry by or dispute with HMRC.

A Solar Protect policy will enable your accountant (your tax return agent) to:

• Deal with any correspondence from HMRC
• Attend any meeting with HMRC
• Appeal to the First-tier Tribunal or Upper Tribunal
• Having the security of knowing that fees will be met in full will enable your Accountant (your tax return agent) to defend your position robustly

Please click here for details.

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 Ups Interest Rates on Unpaid Tax

 

HMRC is screwing the taxpayers again, by raising interest rates on unpaid tax to a 13-year high of 4.25% — six times the rate paid on money it owes.

This is 1.5% higher than the start of the year when its late-payment fee was 2.75%. 

HMRC raised its repayment rates from 0.5% to 0.75%.

HMRC is screwing taxpayers.

Greed, apparently, is good!

Tax does have to be taxing.

Tax Investigation Insurance

Market leading tax fee protection insurance for businesses, sole traders and individuals. Protect yourself from accountancy fees in the event of an HMRC enquiry.

Having a Solar Protect Tax Investigation Insurance policy at your disposal means that should you be one of the many 1000's of businesses or individuals that are selected by HMRC each year to look into your tax affairs your own accountant (your tax return agent) can get on and defend you robustly.

You have the peace of mind knowing that your accountant's (your tax return agent) fees will be paid by the insurance without any Excess for you to find.

Tax Investigation Insurance is an insurance policy that will fully reimburse your accountant's (your tax return agent) fees up to £100,000 if you are subject to enquiry by or dispute with HMRC.

A Solar Protect policy will enable your accountant (your tax return agent) to:

• Deal with any correspondence from HMRC
• Attend any meeting with HMRC
• Appeal to the First-tier Tribunal or Upper Tribunal
• Having the security of knowing that fees will be met in full will enable your Accountant (your tax return agent) to defend your position robustly

Please click here for details.

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 Increases Late Payment Interest Rates

 

HMRC are increasing their late payment interest rate from 2.75% to 3%, but are not increasing their repayment rates!

HMRC late payment and repayment interest rates

The current late payment and repayment interest rates applied to the main taxes and duties that HMRC currently charges and pays interest on are:

• late payment interest rate — 3.0% from 21 February 2022
• repayment interest rate — 0.5% from 29 September 2009

HMRC interest rates are shown in the tables below.

Income Tax, National Insurance contributions, Capital Gain Tax, Stamp Duty Land Tax, Stamp Duty and Stamp Duty Reserve Tax (from 1 October 1999)

From	Late payment %	Repayment %
21 February 2022	3.00	0.50
4 January 2022	2.75	0.50

Tax does have to be taxing.

Tax Investigation Insurance

Having a Solar Protect Tax Investigation Insurance policy at your disposal means that should you be one of the many 1000's of businesses or individuals that are selected by HMRC each year to look into your tax affairs your own accountant (your tax return agent) can get on and defend you robustly.

You have the peace of mind knowing that your accountant's (your tax return agent) fees will be paid by the insurance without any Excess for you to find.

Tax Investigation Insurance is an insurance policy that will fully reimburse your accountants (your tax return agent) fees up to £100,000 if you are subject to enquiry by or dispute with HMRC.

A Solar Protect policy will enable your Accountant (your tax return agent) to:

• Deal with any correspondence from HMRC
• Attend any meeting with HMRC
• Appeal to the First-tier Tribunal or Upper Tribunal
• Having the security of knowing that fees will be met in full will enable your Accountant (your tax return agent) to defend your position robustly

Please click here for details.

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"

Interest Rate Hike

I see that the furore over HMRC raising interest rates on overdue tax to 3% won't die down.

Both the Independent and Guardian have published pieces about it in the last few days.

Clive Gawthorpe, a partner at UHY Hacker Young, said:

"This is simply about HMRC clawing more money from taxpayers because of the desperate state of the public finances.

The rate charged by HMRC on late payment will be six times higher than the Bank of England base rate for most taxes.

Banks found it difficult to justify this kind of behaviour and have faced accusations of usury from the Government itself.

Why not harmonise the rate at 1.5 per cent charged for some corporation tax?

That would seem reasonable in view of the current base rate."

Doubtless our very bankrupt government will listen...LOL!

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

What is TAXWISE?

TAXWISE 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 Taxwise

Tax Investigation for Dummies, by Nick Morgan, provides a good and easy to read guide for anyone caught up in an HMRC tax investigation. A must read for any Self Assessment taxpayer.

Click the link to read about: Tax Investigation for Dummies

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"

Taxing The Dead

There are two certainties in life, death and taxes.

The Treasury has, over the last 30 years, managed to combine the two via imposing the iniquitous IHT. However, until now, bereaved families have been at least given some time to pay it with penalties for late payment (six months after death) never going beyond base rate.

Sadly, since the government has managed to bankrupt the country it is now desperate for every penny that it can raise in order to pay its own wage bill. As such, HMRC will be increasing the rate it charges on IHT late payments to 3% (2.5% above base).

Ironically, where there is a tax overpayment HMRC will only pay 1% below base rate, with a floor of 0.5% (ie 0.5% at current base rate).

HMRC say:

"Interest is not a penalty but compensation for tax paid late.

We are streamlining the rates charged and paid for interest to simplify and make things fairer for customers.

This has been subject to extensive consultation over the last 18 months and has been largely welcomed by customer groups and their representatives.

The alignment of rates that will take place in September will mean that all tax paid late is subject to interest at the same rate, so ensuring all taxpayers are treated equally.

And in the interest of fairness we will also be introducing a repayment interest floor, to ensure that any taxpayer overpaying tax will receive interest."

- How is it fair to penalise the bereaved in this manner?

- How is it fair to charge 3% for late payments, but only pay 0.5% when tax has been overpaid?

- How can anyone seriously describe taxpayers as "customers"?

- How did HMRC manage to issue such a bullshit statement whilst keeping a straight face?

Tax does have to be taxing.

Professional Cover Against the Threat of Costly TAX and VAT Investigations

What is TAXWISE?

TAXWISE 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 Taxwise

Tax Investigation for Dummies, by Nick Morgan, provides a good and easy to read guide for anyone caught up in an HMRC tax investigation. A must read for any Self Assessment taxpayer.

Click the link to read about: Tax Investigation for Dummies

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"

One Rule For HMRC

I am pleased to see that HMRC have finally decided to cut their interest rates, in response to the ongoing cuts in UK base rates.

The rate that HMRC charges tardy taxpayers has been reduced from 4.5% to 3.5%.

Unfortunately, as with many matters related to HMRC, there is one small fly in their oinkment. Up until now, where tax had been overpaid, HMRC paid 0.75% on the overpaid amount.

Can you guess what they will pay now?

Yes, that's right:

ZILCH!

One rule for HMRC, another for the taxpayer.

Tax does have to be taxing.

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"

SAYE Bonus Rates Reduced

Bonus rates for the Save As You Earn (SAYE) Sharesave scheme, administered by HMRC, have been reduced as a result of the cut in interest rates.

The FT notes that:

"On a three-year contract, the bonus rate is now 1.5 times the value of an employee's monthly payments, down from 2.4 times. This lowers the effective interest rate to 2.67%, down from 4.23%".

When will the rate charged by HMRC on overdue tax be cut in line with interest rates?

Tax does have to be taxing.

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"

Interest Rates

Now that the banks have succumbed to pressure from Alistair Darling to cut their loan rates, in response to the 1.5% cut in rates by the Bank of England last week, when will HMRC cut their rates?

Currently HMRC charges 6.5% on overdue tax.

Tax does have to be taxing.

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"

Draconian Penalties

Take heed fellow taxpayers, those of you who are late filing returns or paying your tax demands may well face draconian tax-geared penalties under recent proposals put forward by HMRC.

The penalties for late filing might start after six months, potentially rising to 100% of the tax bill after a year in cases where taxpayers had deliberately failed to file returns.

Needless to say, these proposal have not gone down well with those who deal with HMRC on a daily basis. John Whiting of PwC said that he objected "very strongly" to tax-based penalties for late returns.

For why?

Aha, you see dear readers there is an additional charge..taxpayers will also be charged interest based on the amount of tax due.

A double whammy!

Why so greedy HMRC?

As I have said before the government is broke, it desperately needs as much extra revenue as possible to fund its ill thought out spending programmes and pay for its out of control consultancy fees.

On top of the fines mentioned above for late returns, taxpayers also face penalties for late payment that could rise to 10-30% of the unpaid tax after a year.

Roy Maugham of UHY Hacker Young called the proposed "draconian".

Chas Roy-Chowdhury of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants also noted that HMRC is applying one rule for itself, but another for the taxpayer. He said the "huge disparity" in interest rates charged on overdue tax and paid to taxpayers owed repayments was unjustified.

"When taxpayers make a mistake they are penalised. There needs to be an understanding that when [the Revenue] makes a mistake they are equally penalised."

HMRC claim that the differential is needed to discourage taxpayers from depositing money with the Revenue, in order to obtain a higher rate of return than was available commercially. Nice idea, but the rate discrepancy doesn't have to be so much to do that.

Why not simply charge and offer the same interest rate (eg LIBOR plus 1%) for late returns and overpayments?

HMRC are trying to have their cake and eat it.

Tax does have to be taxing.

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"