HMRC Spends £7M on O365

On 22 January, HMRC received Cabinet Office approval to spend £4.9m on O365 software. The green light for an additional outlay of £850,000 was granted exactly two months later.

Public Technology reports that in Q1 of the current financial year HMRC spent an additional £1.2m on rolling out Microsoft’s Office 365 technology, taking total spending on the deployment to about £7m.

O365 is Microsoft’s flagship hosted software product, and offers cloud-based versions of a range of popular productivity programs, such as Word, Excel, and Outlook.

Is this money well spent?


Tax does have to be taxing.

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

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Jacky Wright Leaving HMRC 11 October

Chief Digital and Information Officer, Jacky Wright, will leave HMRC on Friday 11 October, to return to Microsoft US.

Succession plans will be announced in October, before she leaves.

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 £112M Microsoft Deal

Public Technology reports that HMRC has gained central approval for Microsoft (the company that routes its sales through Ireland) licensing deals worth £111.75m, according to data published late last month. 

The department received the green light for spending of £106m on ‘Microsoft Licence E5’ on 25 March. Microsoft’s Office 365 Enterprise E5 licences usually include Skype for Business, security and compliance features and Power BI analytics, as well as the suite’s standard software. It also gained approval to spend £4.9m on Office 365 on 22 January, and a further £850,000 on the same on 22 March.

HMRC’s current chief digital and information officer Jacky Wright is on a two-year secondment from Microsoft, scheduled to end this October. HMRC’s annual report published in July said:

“She does not participate in any commercial decisions specifically concerning Microsoft.” 

When I was an auditor many moons ago, training to be an FCA, we were always told that we should not just be independent, but look independent!

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"

Je Recuse - Jacky Wright's "Civic Leave"

Last week, when writing about Jacky Wright becoming the new CDIO of HMRC, I said:

"At least now, maybe, HMRC will upgrade from Windows 7!"

Sadly for HMRC staff struggling with outdated operating systems this will not be the case, for Ms Wright hasn't actually left Microsoft; she is on "civic leave". 

Thanks for all well wishes and Microsoft for allowing employees to take a Civic Leave. Look forward to joining HMRC! https://t.co/oKvCwFd0sa

— Jacky Wright (@WrightJacky) September 18, 2017

During this two year leave of absence she has recused herself from any Microsoft related issues, as per HMRC quoted by The Register:

"Jacky will be appointed to HMRC on a fixed two-year contract.

She must recuse herself from any discussion and decisions relating to Microsoft, both within HMRC and across Government and we will put in place the necessary governance to manage."

Okey dokey, so in summary HMRC have hired a two year manager for a five or more year job who can't actually touch anything Microsoft related, even though HMRC has around 85,000 desktops running Microsoft.

Oh yes, that will work fine and dandy!

Oh, and by happenstance, Hotmail suffered a European wide outage yesterday for several hours. Maybe the net gods were sending us a warning about 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"

EU Country Sells To Customers In Another EU Country - Shock Horror Probe!

Microsoft has reportedly avoided up to £100m a year in UK corporation tax by allegedly "routing" its sales through Ireland.

The corporation has sent more than £8bn of revenues from computers and software, bought by British customers, to Ireland since 2011 as part of a deal with HMRC the Sunday Times reports.


The arrangements, known as advance pricing agreements, agree on the allocation of profit between various countries.

HMRC approved Microsoft's offshore structure in 2012, in a deal which runs from 2011 to 2017.

At this point it is worth remembering that, as part of the EU, an Irish company has every right to sell to UK customers.

A spokesperson for HMRC is quoted by the Independent:

“No company will pay a single penny less in tax because of Advance Payments Agreements.

These simply set out how the tax rules will apply on complex transactions ahead of time and we keep them under constant review.”

Thus the discussion begins..... 

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"

Farewell Windows XP

Just to reminded everyone, as from yesterday Microsoft stopped providing free support for Windows XP.

Here is what I wrote about it in February:

"HMRC has 85,784 PCs, of which 85,268 are moving off Windows XP and 58,631 are ditching Internet Explorer 6.

 

As from 8th April this will present a security weakness, as Microsoft will stop offering free support for XP and will no longer provide any protection to block malicious codes and potential hacks that steal users' data. As from then Microsoft will charge an outlandish £122 per desktop for year one, £244 for year two and £490 for year three.
Suffice to say HMRC will not be paying for this service.
However, not to worry, an HMRC spokesperson is quoted by the Guardian:

"HMRC takes security extremely seriously and has many controls in place to guard against online threats. HMRC is already upgrading our IT software and our systems will remain secure whilst this is happening." 

No problem then, except for the fact that the upgrade from XP and Windows 6 won't be completed by April!"

As a loyal reader reminded us yesterday:

"Don't forget the vast majority of us working in HMRC are still running windows xp (no longer supported by Microsoft) and using ie6 as a browser!"

I dare say in the months to come, this security weakness will be fixed!

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 Does A £10M Deal With Microsoft

The Register reports that IT reseller Computacenter has brokered an Enterprise Agreement (EA) between Microsoft and HMRC valued at roughly £10M. The agreement entitles HMRC to volume discounts on Redmond gear, upgrades and more over the next three years.

It is understood Computacenter will take a small cut for hooking up the two organisations; HMRC's last EA with Microsoft expired in 2008.

The agreement covers about 90,000 desktops across HMRC, and ends the four-year hiatus between the government department and Microsoft. Apparently HMRC "didn't see the value in renewing" back in 2008 as it hadn't made much use of Redmond's products on offer.

Ironically Microsoft were recently featured in the Sunday Times in an article on tax avoidance (which Cameron claims is morally repugnant):

"Microsoft is channelling online payments for sales of its new Windows 8 operating system to Luxembourg as part of a scheme that avoids UK corporation tax on more than £1.7bn a year of revenue. 

The Sunday Times has established that a small office in a Luxembourg business park with just six staff handles hundreds of millions of pounds from online Microsoft sales in the UK and the rest of Europe. 

The bulk of the money is transferred to Microsoft’s European headquarters in Ireland. Profits can then be routed to Bermuda without UK corporation tax being paid."

How ironic!

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



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"