HMRC has updated its guidance on the procedure for authorised representatives of corporate bodies to make a voluntary disclosure (self-report) about a failure to prevent the facilitation of UK tax evasion, giving rise to an offence under the Criminal Finances Act 2017.
Reports can now be sent online via the government gateway. Self-reporting does not guarantee that a relevant body will escape prosecution, but may form part of its defence. See bit.ly/2BOFegD.
The guidance was first published in September 2017, at the time the new offences came into force.
Penny Simmons, a tax lawyer at Pinsent Masons, commented: ‘17 months have passed since the offences were introduced, so HMRC will expect a business to have conducted a comprehensive risk assessment and to have introduced new and enhanced controls to reduce the scope for facilitation of tax evasion by its employees and those providing services in its name.’
‘The reminder is particularly apt given that HMRC has recently begun its first criminal investigations under the offences’, Simmons added.
HMRC has updated its guidance on the procedure for authorised representatives of corporate bodies to make a voluntary disclosure (self-report) about a failure to prevent the facilitation of UK tax evasion, giving rise to an offence under the Criminal Finances Act 2017.
Reports can now be sent online via the government gateway. Self-reporting does not guarantee that a relevant body will escape prosecution, but may form part of its defence. See bit.ly/2BOFegD.
The guidance was first published in September 2017, at the time the new offences came into force.
Penny Simmons, a tax lawyer at Pinsent Masons, commented: ‘17 months have passed since the offences were introduced, so HMRC will expect a business to have conducted a comprehensive risk assessment and to have introduced new and enhanced controls to reduce the scope for facilitation of tax evasion by its employees and those providing services in its name.’
‘The reminder is particularly apt given that HMRC has recently begun its first criminal investigations under the offences’, Simmons added.
