Reply to: Kaye Adams

[SueEllen]

Apparently HMRC are now going to leave her alone.

[Fraidycat]

No idea who Kaye Adams is, but Maryam Moshiri is a Legend:

[vetran]

It may be working for the Civil Services makes you "rather strange", insane and inept.

Being married to Ziggy has other impacts?

[SueEllen]

Having met quite a few "Civil" servants I have found most of them to be "rather strange" members of society who seem to gravitate to this last refuge for the insane and inept and are most likely unemployable elsewhere.

Opinions my own, obviously my DW hasn't vetted this post, she works for the Civil Service.

It may be working for the Civil Services makes you "rather strange", insane and inept.

[Zigenare]

I always wonder who at hmrc decides if a case should be brought forward against someone? cause loads of these case, when you read into the details, it's obviously 100% lost at the tribunal, so what's the effing point? I know hmrc has endless cash, but surely at some stage someone should be saying, lets just ignore this one, we will definitely loose. It seems they either:

a) don't effing know what they are doing
b) don't care they are going to loose
c) they do it for publicity to scare others
d) all / mix of some

Now you could of course do some sort of audit and fine them, but...it would come out of taxpayers pockets anyway, so what's the point. Or maybe look at the people who bring cases forward and if they loose constantly, sack the feckers, as clearly they are wasting money and getting nowhere.

Bloody useless morons. Especially as there's loads of people clearly breaking IR35 rules and not getting investigated at all.

Anybody who doesn't understand the difference between loose (as in morals) and lose (as in defeat) should be audited by HMRC and taken to the effing cleaners!

With regards to your points above... "a" - most definitely, "b" - it doesn't matter if they lose as they'll keep going until they can make it a "win", "c" - they do think they're a law unto themselves and ultimately nobody within HMRC is held accountable for the decisions they make.

Having met quite a few "Civil" servants I have found most of them to be "rather strange" members of society who seem to gravitate to this last refuge for the insane and inept and are most likely unemployable elsewhere.

Opinions my own, obviously my DW hasn't vetted this post, she works for the Civil Service.

[vetran]

I always wonder who at hmrc decides if a case should be brought forward against someone? cause loads of these case, when you read into the details, it's obviously 100% lost at the tribunal, so what's the effing point? I know hmrc has endless cash, but surely at some stage someone should be saying, lets just ignore this one, we will definitely loose. It seems they either:

a) don't effing know what they are doing
b) don't care they are going to loose
c) they do it for publicity to scare others
d) all / mix of some

Now you could of course do some sort of audit and fine them, but...it would come out of taxpayers pockets anyway, so what's the point. Or maybe look at the people who bring cases forward and if they loose constantly, sack the feckers, as clearly they are wasting money and getting nowhere.

Bloody useless morons. Especially as there's loads of people clearly breaking IR35 rules and not getting investigated at all.

nearly there Audit & fire them!

[dsc]

Nice to see HMRC likes wasting our money -

https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/tax/...rm=Read%20more


Although the disputed tax and NIC bill was £124,000, the amount that would be payable after taking into account taxes already paid by Adams would be in the region of £70,000. Adams has spent much more than that defending her case. Dave Chaplin, CEO of IR35 Shield, who has been supporting Adams since 2019, estimates that HMRC has spent around £250,000 on this case.

I always wonder who at hmrc decides if a case should be brought forward against someone? cause loads of these case, when you read into the details, it's obviously 100% lost at the tribunal, so what's the effing point? I know hmrc has endless cash, but surely at some stage someone should be saying, lets just ignore this one, we will definitely lose. It seems they either:

a) don't effing know what they are doing
b) don't care they are going to lose
c) they do it for publicity to scare others
d) all / mix of some

Now you could of course do some sort of audit and fine them, but...it would come out of taxpayers pockets anyway, so what's the point. Or maybe look at the people who bring cases forward and if they lose constantly, sack the feckers, as clearly they are wasting money and getting nowhere.

Bloody useless morons. Especially as there's loads of people clearly breaking IR35 rules and not getting investigated at all.

[Zigenare]

Sorry it was me copying and pasting. I need to tidy it up.

It's not like you to mindlessly post tulipe just for the sake of posting tulipe before anyone else.

[SueEllen]

lots of duplication in there - copy/paste issues or was it the Torygraph giving the editor's job to an intern again?

Sorry it was me copying and pasting. I need to tidy it up.

[ladymuck]

This is Kaye Adams version of what they are doing in her own words
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/ta...self-employed/

lots of duplication in there - copy/paste issues or was it the Torygraph giving the editor's job to an intern again?

[SueEllen]

Nice to see HMRC likes wasting our money -

https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/tax/...rm=Read%20more


Although the disputed tax and NIC bill was £124,000, the amount that would be payable after taking into account taxes already paid by Adams would be in the region of £70,000. Adams has spent much more than that defending her case. Dave Chaplin, CEO of IR35 Shield, who has been supporting Adams since 2019, estimates that HMRC has spent around £250,000 on this case.

[SueEllen]

They had the best barristers procured at government rates. I had to pay top dollar – £60,000 to defend myself and the risk of their costs on top if I lost. It was more than the tax at stake and a huge gamble but I was damned if I was going to give in to their mafia-style tactics. I won again.
They upped the ante and took it to the Court of Appeal. We are talking eye-watering figures now, sell-the-house time, and this is where it gets dystopian.

The Court of Appeal clarified some points of law – most in my favour – but declined to rule on my case and then awarded full costs to HMRC. They demanded £51,000 from me and the return of the costs I had won at the Upper Tribunal. I am unlikely to get any of that money back.

Cut to the most recent tribunal win – which cost another £75,000 – and it is three nil to me, yet HMRC still says it is “disappointed” in the decision. Why is it disappointed? Three tribunals tasked with enforcing the rule of law agree that I am a self-employed person. Surely, HMRC should be delighted?

Its job is to collect the “correct” amount of tax, not extort as much as it possibly can get away with. I have been inundated by congratulatory messages from people in the media business I don’t even know.
Most are not high-earners and many are saying regretfully: “I buckled”, “I caved in” , “couldn’t take it anymore”, having settled instead of standing their ground.

To be honest, if I had a crystal ball in 2014, I might have done the same. This ordeal on top of my parents’ illness and death took me to the edge on occasions. Is this really the way His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs should conduct itself’?

As far as I can see, the bigger agenda is to push as many freelancers as possible into a mythical status known as “employed for tax purposes” – to pay full-whack tax with zero employment benefits.

[SueEllen]

This is Kaye Adams version of what they are doing in her own words
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/ta...self-employed/

These past nine years have been a hard slog. But after close to a decade of fighting, this week I defeated the taxman for the third time.

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) had been pursuing me for £124,000 in disputed taxes it said I owed relating to my time working as a presenter for the BBC. It would have been closer to £70,000 after off-sets.

It contested my status as a self-employed contractor, claiming I should be taxed as an employee, despite a 30 year career working across many media outlets. Even now , there is still a chance the tax office can appeal again.

Apart from the on-going stress and the punishing legal and accountancy fees in contesting this claim – costs now sit around £200,000, most of it unrecoverable– the most gutting element for me has been the latent suggestion that I am a tax dodger. That is not who I am.

I come from good working-class stock; I take pride in paying my fair dues.

I gave up a safe employment contract more than thirty years ago and since then have worked for countless clients on hundreds of media projects.

I set up my Personal Service Company in 2007, months after the birth of my second daughter on the advice of my accountant. It was standard practice in the industry for freelancers and many companies insisted on it.

Work was thin on the ground at that time and I had no maternity pay to fall back on but I slowly built up a portfolio of engagements including TV, radio, column-writing and corporate hosting.

One of those mixed bag of engagements was a morning radio show for the BBC. When I got a letter from HMRC in 2014 saying they considered me an employee of the BBC, I thought it was laughable. I was paid per show with no employment benefits.

But, five years later, having burned through £125,000 of insurance cover and facing a tribunal, I wasn’t laughing any more.

On the first day of the hearing, HMRC focused its claim on the two years in which my elderly parents fell into ill-health and subsequently passed away. While I did restrict my work for those two years to help care for them, I was sickened that HMRC would seek to take advantage.

When I won, I was elated. Little did I know it was only the start of the nightmare. HMRC appealed – and this is where we get into David and Goliath territory – just as my insurance money had run out. So I had no resources, and they had the bottomless pit of the taxpayers’ purse.

[malvolio]

One hopes the court made this clear! HMRC are spending our money.

I think you mean Vexatious but after 3 failures with the same evidence HMRC need a penalty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frivolous_or_vexatious

It's already cost 50% more than the tax claimed, with a further appeal likely. HMRC's argument is that pursuing single cases to the bitter end would result in many more similar successes.

More evidence, were it needed, that HMRC need a good kicking. Or a chancellor with the guts to stand up to them...

Another related comment in LinkedIn today to the effect that one recent ruling stated that where HMRC's internal manual differed from actual law the law will always take precedence. That also seems to have ignored.

[vetran]

Starts to sound like nuisance litigation or whatever the proper term is. HMRC should be covering her full costs, preferably from Jim Harra's own pocket

One hopes the court made this clear! HMRC are spending our money.

I think you mean Vexatious but after 3 failures with the same evidence HMRC need a penalty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frivolous_or_vexatious