The government is consulting on a proposal to ensure that ‘controlling persons’ working for an organisation have PAYE income tax and NICs deducted at source.
HMRC has published a brief guide to proposals for a voluntary cash basis, and simplified arrangements for some expenses, for small businesses run by self-employed individuals and partnerships.
Recent revelations that 2,000 plus civil servants have been engaged via personal service companies has created a major debate over these types of arrangements in government and the private sector.
Five bodies representing freelancers and small businesses on HMRC’s IR35 Forum claim that new guidance on rules to counter tax avoidance via personal service companies ‘fails to take into account key elements in their advice’, according to PCG (formerly the Professional Contractors Group).
HMRC has reminded electricians that the registration deadline for its Electricians Tax Safe Plan is 15 May. Electricians taking part can pay any tax and interest they owe while benefiting from ‘lower penalties of only 10%, with a maximum of 20%’, HMRC said in a press release.
Small businesses are ‘tomorrow’s Dysons and Microsofts’ and they need government support ‘as much if not more than the big businesses that have already made it’, ICAEW Chief Executive Michael Izza has said.
Setting up a company specifically to avoid tax is ‘aggressive tax avoidance’ and should be distinguished from investment in pensions or genuine start-up businesses, the Prime Minister suggested today.
Three million businesses with a turnover below £77,000 stand to benefit from a voluntary cash basis for income tax and simplified arrangements for certain expenses, HMRC said in a consultation paper,
A plumber was jailed for 12 months yesterday for evading £91,000 of income tax and NICs during 10 years of trading.