First - there will be some of you who see this as touting for business. If the proposal below comes to fruition and if me or my firm is engaged to help, then I/we will benefit. If that happens, we will be on commercial terms based on existing hourly rates. If this is a reason why you would not consider the below, so be it - you have been warned.
The present tax situation for contractors has a number of areas which may be susceptible for a legal challenge. These include:
We all know that arguing these points with HMRC will be a slow and expensive process and HMRC is adept at playing the game of wearing out your funds and enthusiasm long before you get to any reasonably sensible conclusion. This is especially the case where individuals are going it alone.
Our (WTT) opinion is that certainly the first two matters above can only be effectively challenged in a mass action that is funded and ready to go as early as possible.
That action should look to start as soon as we see the legislation which I'm guessing will be when the next Budget happens. That might be late June/early July if the new crop of MP's get their act together or perhaps they will wait until the planned Autumn Budget. Let's hope for the latter.
We (WTT) are not a law firm. We cannot therefore undertake the work necessary to prepare, present and prosecute a legal challenge. We have our favourites to do this work, but there are many law firms out there and some form of beauty parade is sensible.
We (WTT) would however be prepared to assist in bringing together a group and providing assistance where we can. We see this as being a ringfenced part of our Big Group forum to begin with. Hopefully however it will grow quickly and given that most of you here are IT specialists, I would hope that hosting and administrating the group would swiftly move off our forum (and cost base).
We see ourselves as offering help in how to constitute and administer the group and provide advice and experience. It may be that the group also wishes to use us (WTT) for tax advice, but again, there are lots of other tax firms out there.
The group would need two things immediately.
The first is a committee. This is perhaps a pathfinder group who can agree a constitution and aims and control the funds and processes such as the beauty parades. We see this as something to be done in the next 4 to 6 weeks.
The second is funds. We (WTT) are not authorised to hold client funds and have no wish to do so. The above committee therefore needs a bank account and signing powers etc. This is because, in our opinion, trying to launch a legal action without funds and holding out the collecting tin only at the point the lawyers need paying, is doomed to fail. The difference between those shouting about unfairness and those prepared to back it with money is wide.
So we see a real need to get ORGANISED.
Organised QUICKLY.
Ready to go this Autumn at the latest.
We are prepared to help get this off the ground and rolling.
We are prepared to recommend to Big Group members the benefits of joining.
We are prepared to be involved/not involved as the committee above decides.
Who's in?
The present tax situation for contractors has a number of areas which may be susceptible for a legal challenge. These include:
- 2019 charge including closed years
- 2019 charge applying to non resident people
- unfairness in application of settlement proposals
- unfairness in collection practices
- whether COP8/discovery is valid and therefore years are open/closed
We all know that arguing these points with HMRC will be a slow and expensive process and HMRC is adept at playing the game of wearing out your funds and enthusiasm long before you get to any reasonably sensible conclusion. This is especially the case where individuals are going it alone.
Our (WTT) opinion is that certainly the first two matters above can only be effectively challenged in a mass action that is funded and ready to go as early as possible.
That action should look to start as soon as we see the legislation which I'm guessing will be when the next Budget happens. That might be late June/early July if the new crop of MP's get their act together or perhaps they will wait until the planned Autumn Budget. Let's hope for the latter.
We (WTT) are not a law firm. We cannot therefore undertake the work necessary to prepare, present and prosecute a legal challenge. We have our favourites to do this work, but there are many law firms out there and some form of beauty parade is sensible.
We (WTT) would however be prepared to assist in bringing together a group and providing assistance where we can. We see this as being a ringfenced part of our Big Group forum to begin with. Hopefully however it will grow quickly and given that most of you here are IT specialists, I would hope that hosting and administrating the group would swiftly move off our forum (and cost base).
We see ourselves as offering help in how to constitute and administer the group and provide advice and experience. It may be that the group also wishes to use us (WTT) for tax advice, but again, there are lots of other tax firms out there.
The group would need two things immediately.
The first is a committee. This is perhaps a pathfinder group who can agree a constitution and aims and control the funds and processes such as the beauty parades. We see this as something to be done in the next 4 to 6 weeks.
The second is funds. We (WTT) are not authorised to hold client funds and have no wish to do so. The above committee therefore needs a bank account and signing powers etc. This is because, in our opinion, trying to launch a legal action without funds and holding out the collecting tin only at the point the lawyers need paying, is doomed to fail. The difference between those shouting about unfairness and those prepared to back it with money is wide.
So we see a real need to get ORGANISED.
Organised QUICKLY.
Ready to go this Autumn at the latest.
We are prepared to help get this off the ground and rolling.
We are prepared to recommend to Big Group members the benefits of joining.
We are prepared to be involved/not involved as the committee above decides.
Who's in?
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