General

HMRC have sent ‘nudge’ letters to individuals who they believe have undeclared income from letting holiday homes and short term lets on sites such as Airbnb and Booking.com. Key dates If you have received income from holidays lets you need to tell HMRC about it by completing a self-assessment tax return. The return must be … Read more

You are able to claim child benefit if you are responsible for bringing up a child under the age of 16, or under the age of 20 where the child stays in approved education or training. However, some or all of the child benefit that you receive may be clawed by back by the High … Read more

Class 3 National Insurance contributions are voluntary contributions which an individual can choose to pay to increase their entitlement to the state pension. Individuals who have gaps in their contribution record for the tax years from 2006/07 to 2015/16 have a limited window in which to take advantage of an extended time limit for making … Read more

Individual callers to some HMRC helplines from mobile phones may find that rather than speaking with an adviser they are now sent an SMS text message directing them to online services and guidance. Key dates Since 19 January 2023, HMRC have been trialling sending an SMS text message response to some callers to their income … Read more

Once we pass the end of the current financial year, 31 March 2023 for companies and 5 April 2023 for individuals, the opportunity to take legitimate action to save tax in the 2022-23 tax year will evaporate. I would have to write a book to lists all of these opportunities but have listed below some … Read more

Why does our tax year end on 5th April? Like so many of the regulations that govern our lives, the legislative processes underpinning these rules are anachronisms – things that belong to the past. For example, the present tax year ends on 5th April 2022. The reason that our tax year ends on this obscure … Read more

HMRC were quick to publicise their victory in a recent tax case that resulted in a well-known football agent facing a £1.2m tax bill. According to their press release, former football agent Jerome Anderson lost his £1.2 million tax battle with HMRC during a case heard at the Upper Tribunal. This showed that Anderson and … Read more

At the beginning of August, the Office for Tax Simplification (OTS) – a government department charged with coming up with new ideas to simplify our tax system – issued a number of reports and recommendations. They include a number of interesting topics and we have shared the conclusions below: Changes to capital allowances At present, … Read more

From 1 October more than 100 countries, including the UK, will be able to exchange data on financial accounts under the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). CRS data will significantly enhance HMRC’s ability to detect offshore non-compliance and it is in taxpayers’ interests to correct any non-compliance before that data is received. The most common reasons … Read more

We are often quizzed by clients who are contemplating working from home: what are the tax consequences? And in particular, will I have to pay capital gains tax? Capital gains tax Generally speaking, if your business use is limited to allocating space for a home office, then as long as there is duality of use, … Read more