Settlement Opportunity

[fielder]

I joined this forum a few months back with a view to bringing a view from the tax professional side of the fence, aided by my regular meetings with HMRC and their motives. I hope I have brought some objectivity to the debate, supplied some useful information and most of all, taken away some of the mystery of the position you and HMRC are in. Knowledge is power and if you have better knowledge you achieve better results.

My day job is dealing with complex "investment" schemes that HMRC consider are pretty much all tax avoidance schemes. Some of these you will have read about in the papers who report them with varying degrees of accuracy or sympathy depending on who their favourite celebrity is at the time. Backed by 35+ years of working in tax, the last 8 or so in tax "planning", I think I have the right tools.

That day job is demanding more of my time with the result that I will (with considerable regret) be cutting back on the time I spend here.

My firm's main activities are bringing claims for mis-selling the above tax products and finding solutions with HMRC for our clients. To a degree, dependent upon circumstances, that may be of assistance to some of you. If you wish, please PM me for more details.

I'm not leaving completely and will continue to post and provide links to useful information, but I have to be fair to those who pay me.

Thanks for your time.

Thank you also for your input to date.

[FTTM]

I joined this forum a few months back with a view to bringing a view from the tax professional side of the fence, aided by my regular meetings with HMRC and their motives. I hope I have brought some objectivity to the debate, supplied some useful information and most of all, taken away some of the mystery of the position you and HMRC are in. Knowledge is power and if you have better knowledge you achieve better results.

My day job is dealing with complex "investment" schemes that HMRC consider are pretty much all tax avoidance schemes. Some of these you will have read about in the papers who report them with varying degrees of accuracy or sympathy depending on who their favourite celebrity is at the time. Backed by 35+ years of working in tax, the last 8 or so in tax "planning", I think I have the right tools.

That day job is demanding more of my time with the result that I will (with considerable regret) be cutting back on the time I spend here.

My firm's main activities are bringing claims for mis-selling the above tax products and finding solutions with HMRC for our clients. To a degree, dependent upon circumstances, that may be of assistance to some of you. If you wish, please PM me for more details.

I'm not leaving completely and will continue to post and provide links to useful information, but I have to be fair to those who pay me.

Thanks for your time.

Rob79 - thank you very much for your input , i have found your knowledge and guidance very helpful.

[DarnEBTs]

I joined this forum a few months back with a view to bringing a view from the tax professional side of the fence, aided by my regular meetings with HMRC and their motives. I hope I have brought some objectivity to the debate, supplied some useful information and most of all, taken away some of the mystery of the position you and HMRC are in. Knowledge is power and if you have better knowledge you achieve better results.

My day job is dealing with complex "investment" schemes that HMRC consider are pretty much all tax avoidance schemes. Some of these you will have read about in the papers who report them with varying degrees of accuracy or sympathy depending on who their favourite celebrity is at the time. Backed by 35+ years of working in tax, the last 8 or so in tax "planning", I think I have the right tools.

That day job is demanding more of my time with the result that I will (with considerable regret) be cutting back on the time I spend here.

My firm's main activities are bringing claims for mis-selling the above tax products and finding solutions with HMRC for our clients. To a degree, dependent upon circumstances, that may be of assistance to some of you. If you wish, please PM me for more details.

I'm not leaving completely and will continue to post and provide links to useful information, but I have to be fair to those who pay me.

Thanks for your time.

Indeed been useful and who knows whether some may need your settlement expertise or not. Hope it doesn't come to that. Thanks

[pimpernell]

I joined this forum a few months back with a view to bringing a view from the tax professional side of the fence, aided by my regular meetings with HMRC and their motives. I hope I have brought some objectivity to the debate, supplied some useful information and most of all, taken away some of the mystery of the position you and HMRC are in. Knowledge is power and if you have better knowledge you achieve better results.

My day job is dealing with complex "investment" schemes that HMRC consider are pretty much all tax avoidance schemes. Some of these you will have read about in the papers who report them with varying degrees of accuracy or sympathy depending on who their favourite celebrity is at the time. Backed by 35+ years of working in tax, the last 8 or so in tax "planning", I think I have the right tools.

That day job is demanding more of my time with the result that I will (with considerable regret) be cutting back on the time I spend here.

My firm's main activities are bringing claims for mis-selling the above tax products and finding solutions with HMRC for our clients. To a degree, dependent upon circumstances, that may be of assistance to some of you. If you wish, please PM me for more details.

I'm not leaving completely and will continue to post and provide links to useful information, but I have to be fair to those who pay me.

Thanks for your time.

Thanks Rob. Much appreciated

[dangerouswhensober]

Indeed been useful and who knows whether some may need your settlement expertise or not. Hope it doesn't come to that. Thanks

Absolutely agree - your experience & expertise are invaluable here Rob - many thanks for all of your advice thus far - and I think it's more than likely that your company will benefit in some way in the future, even though you do not represent individual contractors.

Best wishes.

[gettingangry]

Finally got a reply after 10 weeks of waiting.
They have given me figures for 2005-6, 2008-9, 2009-10 and 2010-11.
2006-7 and 2007-8 they say that they failed to protect their position. They also say that there are no "current" Inheritance tax charges.

I never received any notice regarding 2005-2006 and that they must be joking about adding this and the interest for which they kindly provided a breakdown. Going back a staggering 2825 days the interest rate charged varied between 2.5% to 8.5%.

On the final page they breakdown the amount of tax due for each year 2005-6 and 2010-11 are listed as type ENQUIRY, 2008-9 and 2009-10 are listed as type ASSESSMENT. Any one any idea what this means?

Also regarding not taking the settlement opportunity ... they say "
... we assume you are not interested in taking the settlement opportunity. We will then continue to gather evidence on your case as we proceed towards the Tribunal" - I'm confused about this - APNs or Tribunal???

[slatt]

APNs or Tribunal???

most likely an APN whilst you wait for the tribunal....

[Rob79]

Finally got a reply after 10 weeks of waiting.
They have given me figures for 2005-6, 2008-9, 2009-10 and 2010-11.
2006-7 and 2007-8 they say that they failed to protect their position. They also say that there are no "current" Inheritance tax charges.

I never received any notice regarding 2005-2006 and that they must be joking about adding this and the interest for which they kindly provided a breakdown. Going back a staggering 2825 days the interest rate charged varied between 2.5% to 8.5%.

On the final page they breakdown the amount of tax due for each year 2005-6 and 2010-11 are listed as type ENQUIRY, 2008-9 and 2009-10 are listed as type ASSESSMENT. Any one any idea what this means?

Also regarding not taking the settlement opportunity ... they say "
... we assume you are not interested in taking the settlement opportunity. We will then continue to gather evidence on your case as we proceed towards the Tribunal" - I'm confused about this - APNs or Tribunal???

OK.

2006/07 and 2007/08, HMRC has not advised you of an enquiry, has not raised an assessment and is now too late to open those years failing a discovery which it sounds they don't have grounds for.

ACTION - ask HMRC to confirm that those years are closed with no further liability.

Difference between "Enquiry" and "assessment" is largely legal and has little practical effect. The only point might be that an "Enquiry" can perhaps lead to penalty in some circumstances although that is usually rare. (I say usually because I met with HMRC last week on something similar and it seems that attitudes may be hardening).

If you choose not to settle, HMRC assume that your position will be determined by the result of a Tribunal hearing. That may be your case or another person in a similar scheme(s). That Tribunal hearing may be weeks away or perhaps a year or more. I do know that a couple of EBT/loan type schemes are at Tribunal soon and if yours might be one of them.

Regardless of whether your case goes to Tribunal soon or not, an APN for the open years is likely.

If you indicate you want to settle, perhaps no APN (although do allow for some administrative incompetence).

I have said before and say again - an APN can be issued no matter what the position on impending litigation or otherwise.

[Rob79]

Thank you all for the kind words - much appreciated.

I'm not leaving for ever, just cutting down and being more selective.

[pimpernell]

Finally got a reply after 10 weeks of waiting.
They have given me figures for 2005-6, 2008-9, 2009-10 and 2010-11.
2006-7 and 2007-8 they say that they failed to protect their position. They also say that there are no "current" Inheritance tax charges.

I never received any notice regarding 2005-2006 and that they must be joking about adding this and the interest for which they kindly provided a breakdown. Going back a staggering 2825 days the interest rate charged varied between 2.5% to 8.5%.

On the final page they breakdown the amount of tax due for each year 2005-6 and 2010-11 are listed as type ENQUIRY, 2008-9 and 2009-10 are listed as type ASSESSMENT. Any one any idea what this means?

Also regarding not taking the settlement opportunity ... they say "
... we assume you are not interested in taking the settlement opportunity. We will then continue to gather evidence on your case as we proceed towards the Tribunal" - I'm confused about this - APNs or Tribunal???

For 2005-2006, if you never received any notice, surely that year is also 'lost' to HMRC because they also didn't protect their position? Can you clarify what you received for that year if anything?