Overdrawn Capital Account Scheme (Aston Mae / Glen Mae / Procorre)

[eek]

IIRC, QC, (or KC today) give opinions. They have no power to approve anything to do with paying correct tax on earnings. My own opinion is that the words are worth the paper they are printed on.

For the scheme operators - and it's been confirmed recently (don't have the details to hand) that they are worth even less than that for scheme members (because they weren't the people paying the Q/KC's bill).

[GregRickshaw]

Ah there it is again the catchall QC approved horses*** trapped many a contractor back in the day myself including. We also know the name often quoted as giving QC approval. The words and the person who spoke them were indeed worth absolutely nothing.

[Fred Bloggs]

IIRC, QC, (or KC today) give opinions. They have no power to approve anything to do with paying correct tax on earnings. My own opinion is that the words are worth the paper they are printed on.

[SteveS]

Hi All,

I am in the same boat as many on this site, joined the Aston Mea/ Procorre venture in 2013 until 2015 while contracting. Been through the HMRC bullying about the tax, had my case shelved/on hold in 2020 and told by Procurre legal it would most probably be left there forever kind of thing. Asked if I could close my company and was told I should be able to, so I did and its been closed for 2 years. Now had a letter from HMRC saying they are going to court to reopen my company as they 'missed' the notification of closure. I have again contacted Procurre legal and asked for their help, I was finally out of the stress zone from all the letters and accusations they were making, that almost cost me my marriage. But it has been over 4 weeks and no reply, called them a number of time and it goes straight to voicemail, the stress is coming back as you can imagine. I feel really let down by Procorre now as I remember when I was being courted by them to do all my accounting for me, that if HMRC did try this I would have their support and legal team to fall back on.

So, I have contacted an accountant that i know who informed me that as HMRC have never taken anyone from the Procorre venture to arbitration and that my company is closed already, with the right legal advice about the company make up or scheme that Procurre used I could fight it. But it would be best if Procurre gave that information and advice.

As it looks like they have dumped me and run, I was hoping someone on here might know of a legal team that have had success in this area, or are representing others in the same boat, i could go to.

Thanks all

Hi All,

An update on this.

So my company has not been opened up again, from what I found out from the court HMRC themselves sent a 'Notice of discontinuance' and stopped the proceedings.

Not sure what that means, but I am sure they could in the future re-apply for the court to open my old company, but they would have to start it all again to do so.
I also received a letter from HMRC saying they are sorry they have not contacted me in a while to update me on their investigations, but they will let me know in the future, it was the politest letter I have ever had from them.

One other thing I have found, going through my Aston Mae emails when they were trying to get my Company onboard to sort my tax/NI, is this:
"This strategy is an Employed structure therefore the responsibility for paying your tax & NICs is ours. Any late payments or underpayments of PAYE would be deemed our responsibility to correct. In short you could never be fined for late payment of tax, or asked to pay the difference if HMRC claimed not enough PAYE had been deducted. Therefore in setting this strategy up, we have invested a lot of time, money and effort in due diligence as the risk essentially sits with us. By doing this we have also gained full QC approval for compliancy.

Joining Aston Mae couldn’t be easier, we do everything for you. I look forward to speaking with you again, meanwhile please find web details below and please do not hesitate to contact me should you have any questions."


Not sure how much this would stand up in a court, but it is something I am going to look into.

[peasant2023]

NickLeeson2

They're not on the HMRC Tax Avoidance scheme list and if you check the "whatdotheyknow" FOI website using keyword, they've recently bid on state sector projects.

Tax Specialists are publicly reporting on LinkedIn that they've reported scheme operators to HMRC repetitively over years but no action was taken.

Doesnt appear that HMRC have challenged them yet.
But it's clear HMRC view the prepaid card as untaxed personal income.

[NickLeeson2]

Just throwing this out there:

The prepaid card was provided by Procorre as a business expense card. Has this been proven in court as not being the case? HMRC can claim it isn't but there is a contract in place that states it is a business service provided by Procorre.

Also,

If you disclosed the partnership on the applicable years can you still off set the income tax over the 3 years precluding the 2019 date?

[peasant2023]

frontmen242
Question 1 -
The tax you owe is determined based on the monies received into:
personal account,
pre-paid card
and the money drawn down from your corporate account
Where applicable (schemes differ)

unfortunately everything in scope must be combined as a single sum into the 2018/2019 tax year and then taxed at a PAYE rate.

Question 2 -
all scheme usage between 2010 and when you exited the scheme is in scope. Your description sounds like at least 3 years in a scheme.

Take everything I wrote as well intentioned but possibly bad advice and seek professional guidance from a tax advisor.

The only point I'd ask you not to ignore, is to please be certain to have someone you trust with you, while you find out what your prospective liability is.

[frontmen242]

OK today I have spent several hours trawling through bank statements etc and realised a fundamental error with the calculation. I cant explain a whole lot due to chemo brain and lack of will power to drudge through endless files.....however.....

I started with Procorre (Sanderosa then Barclay Carter) as it was known then in back end of 2013 working in my original Ltd company, that company was closed mid 2015, however I started a 2nd company using Procorre's recommended accountant Feb 2015, now I see from the Reg 80 its my 2nd company they are chasing but why is it I have to prove personally what monies I received if I were to settle and not from the company?

Secondly I am assuming I do not need to declare the monies received in my 1st company before said returns from 2015 which HMRC are referring too?

Just to say I am totally confused.... happy Saturday!

[peasant2023]

I think you’ve got this the wrong way around. You give them your day rate and in turn they loan you the money back. In theory (and not such a hypothetical one at that - see Felicitas) they can recall the loan. I don’t know if they’d try to charge you interest on it though…

Please correct me if I am wrong, but while there have been attempts, there has been no successful attempt by a promoter to recall a loan post-settlement, to date?

Since a disputed loan cannot be actioned by debt collectors, presumably a promoter has to turn up in a British Courtroom and lay bare the details of how their Tax Avoidance Scheme worked.
That would seem like a suicidal move by a promoter, given that "Spotlight 50" explicitly threatens promoters (and enablers) if they've mis-sold a scheme on or after 16 November 2017...

My understanding is that the most likely outcome, if a settlement is reached with HMRC via Tax Advisor, is that the loan can be written off within 30 to 90 days (subject to IHT) - which seems to make it even more vital to have professional support when seeking a settlement.

[Fred Bloggs]

I agree with all that although not sure all the liability’s have been discharged as I don’t believe I should have to repay a loan unless it’s from the money earned. I am not trying to avoid any tax (in fact the opposite I want to settle what’s due) but question is has a fraud or perhaps more likely a mis-selling scam been perpetrated and should people be held to account ?

I'm sorry, it is what it is.

It's scandalous what's happened with the promoters and tax avoidance scheme operators getting away with it. Nobody will disagree with you on that point. Hold to account? Who and how? It's not going to happen.

Best you can do is set aside the anger, follow the well trodden path and learn for the future.