Blog entries

N Ireland restaurants in HMRC crack-down

Adrian Huston — Mon, 13 May 2013 18:04:41 +0100

HMRC today 13 May 2013 announced a crackdown on the restaurant trade in Northern Ireland, using their various strands of information to decide which businesses need looked at.

This is unfortunate timing by HMRC - given the difficulties the hospitality industry is facing at the moment. The government should be encouraging Northern Ireland business not deciding to hit them when they are down.

If you feel your business is at risk of being investigated - whether you have done anyRead More...

Tax avoidance - the hidden cost

Adrian Huston — Thu, 09 May 2013 14:05:26 +0100

Link to BBC radio article on tax avoidance included later.

Weekly we hear stories about how people are avoiding tax by using legal means and tax loopholes. There is an entire industry around minimising tax for large companies and wealthy people. On the other side of the fence HMRC has teams of people trying to stop or outlaw such tax avoidance practices.

In early May 2013 HMRC announced it is stepping up efforts to tackle transfer pricing. This is the process where internatRead More...

£10 per day to HMRC for late Return penalties?

Adrian Huston — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 17:03:32 +0100

Tax Return fines – how does £10 per day sound?

George Osborne has his calculator out. 500,000 people who are yet to file their 2011/12 Tax Return. From Wednesday 1 May 2013 they will start getting hit with penalties of £10 per day! Yes – per day. Well the Coalition needs to get money from somewhere.

Are you one of them? If so you need to act quickly to file your Return online. If you can’t face it then have someone help you.

By the way don’t make the mistake of filing Read More...

Close Protection abroad - UK HMRC tax-free status - rules change April 2013

Adrian Huston — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 20:54:13 +0100

I am a former Tax Inspector, also ex RMP (TA) and Police Authority Northern Ireland. I now sort out non-residency for hundreds of guys from the UK deployed abroad. Check me out on Linkedin at http://uk.linkedin.com/in/adrianhuston

New rules from April 2013. There is intended to be new legislation for 2013/14 bringing in a new Statutory Residence Test. In the past residency has been assessed using some HMRC booklets and was not actually enshrined in law. This changes thingsRead More...

HMRC names and shames tax fiddlers for first time – who and why?

Adrian Huston — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 02:56:30 +0100

History was made today 21 February 2013. HMRC published its first ever list of people who have fiddled their taxes but not been prosecuted. Up to now if you were caught fiddling then in over 99% of cases HMRC just took a lot of money off you – and your secret was safe. Only HMRC, your accountant and you would know. Only a tiny number of people are taken to court each year.

The gloves are off now and HMRC today used its new law for the first Read More...

Tax refund email scam alert, not from HMRC

Adrian Huston — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 19:22:27 +0100

It’s the phishing season again. Since lots of people filed their tax returns in recent weeks, the criminal fraternity is out to benefit. They are sending out emails suggesting people are due refunds.

Should you read no further, get this – HMRC NEVER EMAILS TO SAY YOU ARE DUE A TAX REFUND.

Read on if you want some background.

We all see these emails which purport to come from our bank and to alert us to something. It’s great when we know we don’t have an account withRead More...

Tax panic as HMRC January deadline looms

Adrian Huston — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 15:06:18 +0100

This December and January I have noticed far more people worried about the fact that they have not submitted their 2011/12 Self Assessment Tax Return. Why, I wonder, are there more people worried than before?

I have a few thoughts:

Last year the 2010/11 Returns were the first where penalties stuck even if your late return showed no tax due.
Late filers got stung with £1,300 (which won’t go down) in fines for being 6 months late – not something you would incur twice!
Rarely aRead More...

Child Benefit tax chaos - your guide

Adrian Huston — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 14:34:13 +0100

CHILD BENEFIT - SPECIAL OFFER: For a special flat fee of £99 (including VAT) we will register you with HMRC and complete the 2012/13 Tax Return for you. This only applies if Child Benefit is the ONLY reason you need to submit a Self Assessment Return. Call 028 9080 6080 or email mail@huston.co.uk

Child Benefit Chaos – a guide

Child Benefit is changing for over a million people. Are you one? Did you do what you needed to by Sunday 6 January 2013? How do you soRead More...

HSBC whistleblower names UK accounts in Jersey - is your tax paid?

Adrian Huston — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 14:51:14 +0100

The Daily Telegraph reported on 9 November 2012 that that same week a bank whistleblower had grassed up 4,388 UK people with accounts at HSBC in Jersey.

HMRC has, unusually, confirmed that they have received this information and will be using it to check the tax rules ‘are being respected’. What a lovely phrase!

What have HMRC been given?

Details of over 4,000 people in the UK who had money in HSBC in Jersey, sometimes known as HSBC Expat. This means their name,Read More...

Earning money as an HMRC informant?

Adrian Huston — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 16:10:11 +0100

HMRC is paying many thousands of pounds each year to informants who tell them about people who are not declaring all of their income.

Paid informants received £373,780 in 2011/12 which was well up on the previous year’s £309,620.

This information was obtained thanks to the London law firm Reynolds Porter Chamberlain LLP (RPC) who extracted it from HMRC under the Freedom of Information Act.

One of RPC’s partners Adam Craggs said “Typically, an HMRC informant will beRead More...

Tax penalties of £1,200 landing in August.

Adrian Huston — Thu, 16 Aug 2012 20:06:01 +0100

Tax chickens come home to roost as £1,200 penalties land

I warned in previous articles that the new penalties for late 2010/11 Tax Returns were eye-watering in their ferocity.

This week the first of the nasty penalty notices have started arriving. I have seen a few for clients who failed to bring us their papers for the year and failed to provide us with estimates to use. They were each charged £1,200 in penalties. This is on top of the £100 there were charged back in FebruaryRead More...

Tax-dodging BBC workers outed in Parliament

Adrian Huston — Mon, 16 Jul 2012 13:36:49 +0100

Updated 1730 16 July 2012:

On Monday 16 July 2012 (3.15pm) The national Public Accounts Committee will discussed ‘Off-payroll public sector pay arrangements.’ MPs quizzed top officials from the BBC, Treasury, HMRC and the Local Government Association about presenters and workers in the public sector who are not actually their employees.

Some tit-bits from today's evidence:

Ms Zarin Patel the Chiefl Financial Officer of the BBC, responsible for tax matters, admitted thatRead More...

Hair-raising tax task-force for N Ireland

Adrian Huston — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 17:43:39 +0100

Hairdressers and beauty salons in Northern Ireland face a clampdown from today. HMRC has launched a taskforce in the province hoping to bring in an extra £2.5 million. Up to 300 businesses may be hit.

This follows a series of taskforces into various business sectors across the UK. Each Taskforce tends to be dedicated to a region of the UK, and now it is Northern Ireland’s turn.

Regular readers of my column may remember that one of only a handful of people jailed in Northern IRead More...

Banking - is the bank branch broken?

Adrian Huston — Mon, 18 Jun 2012 15:00:07 +0100

Today I learned how the push for online banking puts bankers’ jobs at risk.

Now we all know the image of bankers has taken a bit of a hammering of late – largely unjustified as the actions of a few very senior, and very well-paid, risk takers caused the whole industry to be scorned.

Of course with such bad PR we would expect your local bank branch to be a welcoming place. The staff there are the public face of the bank. Their actions keep customers loyal and prevent them lookiRead More...

Belfast man sentenced for cigarette smuggling

Adrian Huston — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 14:18:30 +0100

HMRC tells us that on 31 May 2012 a 40 year-old man who smuggled 200,000 cigarettes through Belfast Port where he worked as boatman, was sentenced to 200 hours community service.

Gerard Maxwell of North Hill Street in Belfast pleaded guilty last month to the evasion of over £47,000 of duty on the smuggled Russian cigarettes after an investigation by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).

John Whiting, Assistant Director Criminal InveRead More...

eBay Amazon & Gumtree beware - the Tax-man clicketh (HMRC)

Adrian Huston — Thu, 17 May 2012 11:06:51 +0100

eBay, Gumtree, Amazon and other online marketplaces are great for getting that long sought item, or pulling in some cash from what you don’t need. So why is the tax-man sniffing around?

See also my VIDEO on this at http://youtu.be/DCvDPGxBU5I

HMRC is being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st Century and the tax inspectors have got to work with the mouse on their desk. Let the clicking begin…

Someone who buys and sells the odd item of stuff they have for personaRead More...

HMRC to smack you for late Tax Returns

Adrian Huston — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 14:43:43 +0100

Anyone who has been issued with, and has still not filed, their 2010/11 Tax Return faces being smacked with horrendous penalties from 1 May 2012. They will have already been fined £100 but that will soon seem like peanuts.

For my YouTube video on this see http://youtu.be/BrWiiJAQ2uM

The 2010/11 year is the first year when HMRC’s penalties get really nasty. The Self Assessment system was introduced in 1996/97 and has always had a £100 penalty for filing the return late. DespiteRead More...

Commentary on Budget 2012

Adrian Huston — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 23:25:45 +0100

View Adrian Huston's views on budget 2012

Tony Blair Tax article quoted in Daily Mail

Adrian Huston — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 15:22:54 +0100

Delighted to see that Peter McKay is using our blog as a source of quality information..

The full text of the Daily Mail article can be read online at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2106849/Pay-earn-Not-youre-Leftie.html

Isle of Man / Guernsey banks handing info to HMRC

Adrian Huston — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 21:24:15 +0100

Letters received in recent days will have caused a few people to choke on their Corn-Flakes. The banks in the Isle of Man and Guernsey are about to pass details for the first time to the UK tax people – the feared HMRC. New clients have already come to us bearing these bank letters and wanting to come clean to HMRC. Wise move.

This comes about because the Isle of Man became the first offshore territory to implement the automatic exchange of information within the EU. This it has done Read More...