Married couples and registered civil partners are allowed to transfer assets to each other during their lifetime or when they die without incurring an Inheritance Tax charge. There is no limit to this relief as long as the receiving spouse or civil partner is UK domiciled. This relief is known as the spouse or civil […]
Sleeping partners wake-up call
Due to a re-interpretation of the law, HMRC announced that from 6 April 2013 sleeping partners will be liable to pay National Insurance. Affected persons should consider the following: Sleeping and inactive limited partners who are not already paying Class 2 NICs will need to register. They can claim for exception from these contributions if […]
Furnished Holiday Let set-back
Last year a case was heard before the First-tier Tribunal that found a Furnished Holiday Let (FHL) property should not be considered an investment for Business Property Relief (BPR) purposes. This was an important decision for owners of FHL businesses as it confirmed the availability of BPR for Inheritance Tax purposes. If the property in […]
VAT repayment taxable?
You may be interested to know that the answer to the title of this post is yes, if certain conditions apply, a repayment of VAT is a taxable receipt. Consider the following tax case where VAT was charged by mistake. Shop Direct Group discovered that they had accounted for VAT on a large number of […]
New contractual conditions for government contracts
From 1 April 2013 bidders for government contracts will need to certify that they are tax compliant and if they fail this test they will be excluded from winning government contracts. The new restrictions will apply to Central government tenders advertised on or after 1 April 2013. The bidding process will include a new pass/fail […]
Google and Amazon face fresh allegations
Multi-national companies continue to draw the attention of the UK press over allegations that they contrive to export profits made in the UK to lower tax jurisdictions. In this way economic activity in the UK escapes UK tax. This in contrast to numerous small and medium sized businesses who are reported to be paying their […]
Word of Mouth Marketing
‘Word of Mouth’ is still one of the most effective marketing techniques, online or offline. In today’s tough market, businesses are fighting for their share of sales. If you can create a reputation and get people talking, you can win new business for your firm. The best thing about word of mouth marketing is that […]
HMRC name and shame list grows
In accordance with legislation HMRC may publish information about a deliberate tax defaulter where: HMRC have carried out an investigation and the person has been charged one or more penalties for deliberate defaults, and those penalties involve tax of more than £25,000. However, their information will not be published if the person earns the maximum […]
Boris calls for London tax raising powers
In a radical rethink of the way in which London is funded the 17 members of the London Commission are due to report this week and are likely to recommend that certain tax raising powers are devolved. It is estimated that Revenue streams of up to £12bn could be placed under local control with a […]