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Plumber convicted of tax evasion
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Accountancy Age A HAMPSHIRE PLUMBER has been found guilty of tax evasion totalling some £112,000 over a 14-year period. Peter Mack, 59, of Ringwood set up a freelance plumbing business in 1997, but never registered his earning with HM Revenue & Customs. Enquiries made by HMRC found Mack had evaded approximately £88,000 in income tax and VAT plus interest, pushing the total up to £112,000. He was arrested at his home...
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No Greece tax comparison, says new CIoT president
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Accountancy Age THE INCOMING PRESIDENT of the Chartered Institute of Taxation has expressed concerns over tax comparisons between Greece and the UK in both the media and public arena. Speaking at CIoT's annual general meeting in Westminster as he succeeds Anthony Thomas, Patrick Stevens said the tax system in Britain is far from broken and allowing the impression to take hold that it was dangerous. Drawing a contrast between the British and Greek...
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TS recalls Pet's star Healy's close links to HMRC
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Accountancy Age ONCE AND FOR ALL it has been proved that TS has a brilliant memory. Auf Wiedersehen Pet and Benidorm star Tim Healy has been in the tax pages for winning a tribunal over expenses that he claimed against his tax bill. This sent TS's synapses into overdrive. Yes, it was the very same actor who'd been provided voiceover work by the taxman back in 2005, where he encouraged brickies, labourers and...
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Green cars will impact Treasury’s coffers
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Accountancy Age THE RISING NUMBER of green cars and other vehicles will leave a £13bn shortfall in motoring taxes by the end of the next decade, despite an expected 44% rise in traffic. The predictions were made by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, an independent think tank, and based its analysis on the government's own forecasts, showing that by 2029, fuel duty will contribute 1.1% GDP, compared with 1.7% today. Fuel excise duty will fall...
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Taxman takes wrong tax from sixth of taxpayers
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Accountancy Age APPROXIMATELY 3.5m people are due to be notified they have paid too much tax due further calculations by the taxman, which will see them receive an average of £379. A further 1.6m people will receive letters saying they have underpaid their taxes next week, with £537 due to be picked up by HM Revenue & Customs. This will be collected primarily by adjusting employees' tax codes to compensate, seeing them take...
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IR35: A year of testing tests looms
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Accountancy Age IT WAS HOPED that when HM Revenue & Customs released guidelines on when contractors' tax rules should be applied, that the issue could be laid to rest and we would all know where we stand on the status of workers. Alas, it was not to be, and despite HMRC's efforts to provide guidelines on IR35 this week, many parties' concerns remain unsatisfied. Many - including small business representatives invited by the...
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HMRC brings 310 more employers into RTI pilot
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Accountancy Age HMRC HAS CONFIRMED that more than 310 employers are scheduled to join its real time information PAYE pilot. The RTI pilot was launched in early April with ten employers. The aim of the project is to have employers updating their PAYE records as and when changes occur, rather than once at the end of every tax year, Accountancy Age's sister publication WSB reports. So far HMRC has...
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HMRC IR35 guidelines draw criticism
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Accountancy Age THE SERIES OF TESTS and scenarios released by HM Revenue & Customs "fails to take into account key elements of advice" provided by small business representatives invited by the Treasury forum to discuss the issue. HMRC "had missed an opportunity to bring clarity, transparency and fairness in dealing with IR35", stated the group, which included the PCG, Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), Freelancer & Contractor Services Association (FCSA), Federation of Small Businesses (FSB)...
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HMRC sets out IR35 stall with new tests
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Accountancy Age A SERIES OF TESTS to gauge the status of workers has been released by HM Revenue & Customs. The IR35 legislation is designed to prevent people who use intermediary companies to sell their services from being better off than if their clients employed them directly. The clarifications come in the wake of recent controversy surrounding the status of 2,000 senior public sector staff who were employed in this manner.HMRC has released...
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Actor Tim Healy in landmark HMRC tax appeal
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Accountancy Age AUF WIEDERSEHEN, PET! actor Tim Healy claimed a partial victory in a landmark tax tribunal against HM Revenue & Customs after it was found his claim for £32,503 in accommodation expenses where "wholly and exclusively for the purposes of his profession", and therefore tax deductible. Healy, who is based in Cheshire, had appeared in the West End musical Billy Elliot for a total of nine months following three months of rehearsals between December...
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ICAS queries Scotland’s tax devolution in paper
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Accountancy Age THE CRITERIA for paying tax in Scotland once tax powers are devolved from Westminster to Holyrood has been questioned in a paper entitled Scotland's Future: What tax system would Scotland want? published by ICAS. The Scotland Bill was given Royal assent at the start of May, with the legislation taking force in April 2016. The move will see powers to levy taxes fully devolved to Edinburgh. In the report, ICAS also...
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Study shows tax evasion crackdown has largely failed
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Accountancy Age THE FLOW OF FUNDS to low-tax jurisdictions has barely changed since 2007, despite significant global efforts to tackle the problem. Deposit data from the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) demonstrates that $2.7trn (£1.7trn) is deposited offshore in spite of unprecedented action taken by worldwide political leaders and a flurry of bi-lateral treaties entered into by offshore banking centres such as the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands, reports The Guardian. ...
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HMRC needs top-to-bottom improvement
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Accountancy Age HMRC HAS MADE HEADLINES for the wrong reasons this week, with a double dose of negative publicity. It was revealed that 12,000 people not had been taken off the register for self assessment tax returns - despite contacting the tax office to arrange for their affairs to be dealt with through PAYE - and sent incorrect penalty warning letters. Adding to the Revenue's catalogue of high profile blunders in recent years, this will not have...
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2,000 senior public staff paid through companies
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Accountancy Age LONG-SERVING public officials are cutting their tax bills by being paid through their own companies. A leaked review initiated by chief secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander has found that 2,000 senior officials are paid through their own company structures, rather than taxed directly through PAYE. Of those, 800 have worked for their department for more than two years. A further 400 have worked for more than a year. ...
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Scotland receives devolved taxation
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Accountancy Age SCOTLAND has been granted the right to set its own rate of income tax to be administered by HM Revenue and Customs for Scottish taxpayers. The powers come after the Scotland Act 2012 was given Royal Assent and is set to apply from April 2016. As a result, Scotland will be able to create new taxes and devolve additional taxes. Income tax in Scotland will be administered through PAYE for employees...
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Fiscal drag pushes up number of top-rate taxpayers
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Accountancy Age A COMBINATION of ‘fiscal drag' and reduction in the criteria for paying 40% tax is thought to be behind a rise in higher-rate payers. Data published by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) shows that the total number of top-rate taxpayers has hit 4.1m - up from 3.8m - with more than 300,000 of that number paying the 50% additional rate. The total number of taxpayers, though, is set to drop this...
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One in four tax helpline calls go unanswered
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Accountancy Age A QUARTER of tax helpline phone calls are unanswered according to the Treasury. HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) has numbers available for taxpayers to call for help and advice, but approximately one in four fails to get through, with no guidelines for how long callers should wait until an adviser picks up. Exchequer secretary, David Gauke said HMRC "does not have a target time for answering telephone calls", reported the Press Association. ...
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The tax avoidance cycle
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Accountancy Age WHEN HMRC claimed victory over the Eclipse 35 film partnership in the courts this week, it was supposedly indicative of a wider trend. The thinking is that in the good times, when the man on the street has more money in his wallet, the general consensus among the populous - and the authorities - is that the rich can plan their affairs as they wish, provided it is lawful. When the...
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Crocodile Dundee's tax battle ends
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Accountancy Age CROCODILE DUNDEE has finally fended off the taxman after entering into a deal. The long-running tax battle between Australian actor Paul Hogan and the country's tax authorities has ended with a settlement. Hogan and his producer compatriot john Cornell were in a dispute over what the tax authorities claimed was an alleged unpaid tax bill of £95m. The settlement is made on a "without admission" basis. He had been blocked from...
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HMRC sends out 12,000 penalty notices in error
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Accountancy Age APPROXIMATELY 12,000 people have been served penalty notices from HM Revenue & Customs in error, having initially been told they no longer need to fill in self-assessment tax forms. The letters warn of £10 daily fines starting on Tuesday for non-filing. The recipients of the letters had originally been told that they could now settle their tax bill through PAYE. Around 130,000 were taken out of the self-assessment process and HMRC's...
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Chancellor's deficit cuts in danger as tax take drops
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Accountancy Age FEEBLE GROWTH and dropping revenues are threatening the chancellor's attempts to cut the deficit after it emerged the government's tax take is down. The Treasury narrowly kept within the Office for Budget Responsibility's guideline of £126bn, in spite of borrowing £18.2bn in March. Official figures show a contraction on key tax figures, an ominous trend for the coming year. Income tax revenue fell by 3.9% to £12.9bn and VAT receipts were...
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HMRC introduces PAYE power to collect debts
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Accountancy Age HM REVENUE & CUSTOMS now has the power to collect debts of less than £3,000 by including them in a taxpayer's PAYE code. The taxman was already able to include underpayments in tax codes, although the new power - effective this month - will now enable it to do this whether the taxpayer agrees or not. The first PAYE coding notices to include these debts were issued between January and March...
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HMRC wins £117m court clash with film partnership
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Accountancy Age HM REVENUE & CUSTOMS has won a court case to prevent a complex investment partnership from claiming £117m in tax reliefs. The partnership, Eclipse 35, involved Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson and former England and Leicester City manager Sven-Göran Eriksson and was looking to claim tax relief on a £1bn film deal with Disney, according to The Times. Had the deal been successful, the 289 investors in the scheme would...
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Livingstone defends his hiring of accountant
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Accountancy Age KEN LIVINGSTONE has hit back at claims he is a tax avoider following growing pressure to explain his use of an accountant and his monetary affairs. Livingston insists he hired the accountant to handle his tax affairs because he "would have just screwed it up" himself. The Labour candidate for London's mayoral elections was attempting to distance himself from accusations of tax avoidance by diverting his income through a private company. ...
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Livingstone defends hiring accountant
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Accountancy Age KEN LIVINGSTONE has hit back at claims he is a tax avoider following growing pressure to explain his use of an accountant and his monetary affairs. Livingston insists he hired the accountant to handle his tax affairs because he "would have just screwed it up" himself. The Labour candidate for London's mayoral elections was attempting to distance himself from accusations of tax avoidance by diverting his income through a private company. ...
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