Payroll tax errors bag the taxman an extra £737m May 16, 2016 Payroll errors are costing companies, particularly smaller companies, a pretty penny, research released today has found. According to the study by accountancy firm UHY Hacker Young, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has bagged itself an additional £737m through investigations into slip-ups on payroll compliance, and over half (£373m) of that amount comes from SMEs. UHY Hacker [...]
EU referendum: National Insurance registrations shows immigration to be higher than thought because of short-term migration, ONS says May 12, 2016 The number of non-UK nationals registering for National Insurance (NI) numbers is higher than other official statistics due to short-term migration, long-awaited analysis has shown. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) found a large number of people entered the UK for a short period of time (one to twelve months) over the past two years, which [...]
HMRC makes almost 1,500 demands in one year to lawyers and accountants to cough up client details May 9, 2016 The UK's tax authority issued just shy of 1,500 demands in the space of a year to lawyers and accountants for information on clients suspected of committing crimes, figures released today show. The research by City law firm RPC discovered the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) issued 1,468 production orders last year – and more than [...]
Panama Papers: Here’s what you need to know ahead of the database release on Monday May 8, 2016 A database packed with information from the Panama Papers leak is due to be released tomorrow, providing authorities worldwide with potentially valuable leads for their investigations. The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) announced that it would be launching the searchable database about a fortnight ago and wrote in a blog post that the database will contain information [...]
Low oil prices will lead to skills crisis for North Sea and mean UK does not realise full potential of oil and gas reserves April 25, 2016 A leading industry expert has raised concerns that low oil prices could dampen the long-term prospects for the North Sea, create a generational skills crisis and lead to oil being left in the ground. Alan McCrae, a partner at PwC who heads up oil and gas tax, said that unless there was a “dramatic recovery [...]
Taxman pockets roughly £87m from people who missed the tax return deadline April 25, 2016 Despite being warned about a £100 late filing penalty, it appears that some people still forgot to circle 31 January in their diary with red pen. According to statistics released today from the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), 870,000 people missed the 31 January 2016 deadline for filing their tax return online. [...]
HMRC launches consultation on simpler tax of life insurance bonds April 22, 2016 Life insurance bonds will be taxed in a simpler way after HMRC launched a consultation into how they should be treated. The bonds are popular investments but have a notoriously complicated tax structure. They allow people to put money away, watch the capital grow and also take out regular chunks if they want to. But bond [...]
HMRC launches new consultation into tax evasion laws for corporates, as Panama Papers scandal rumbles on April 17, 2016 HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has today opened a consultation seeking input on a new offence aimed at businesses which fail to prevent tax evasion. The consultation concerns draft legislation published last December, which would introduce a new offence for corporates that fail to take adequate measures to prevent those working on their behalf from committing, [...]
Britain’s nineteenth century tax system is breaking under twenty-first century strains April 15, 2016 Politicians have noticed (perhaps belatedly) that they have been fiddling with a nineteenth century tax system while taxpayers have been operating in the twenty-first century. The existing tax system is a result of years of tinkering, reflecting the influence of political views and special interest lobbying. This has created vast complexity. We could look to [...]
MPs slam HM Revenue & Customs for not doing enough to tackle tax fraud April 15, 2016 A report released today has criticised the UK's tax authority for not making headway in the battle against tax fraud. The report by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said there had been limited progress made in reducing the losses from tax fraud, which costs HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) around £16bn per year in uncollected taxes. The PAC [...]