Month: February 2019

  • Year-End Tax Guide 2018-19

    Download our Year-End Tax Guide 2018-19

  • The risks of a tax investigation

    Will HMRC come knocking on your door? It’s a fact – humans are bad at assessing risk. We’re terrified of things that rarely happen (plane crashes, power station meltdowns) but relatively blasé about things that are statistically more likely to harm us, such as unwashed lettuce. The likelihood of HMRC swooping to investigate your business’s…

  • Changes to probate in 2019

    Controversial fee increase set to take place from April. From April 2019, some estates in England and Wales could be required to pay almost £6,000 for a service that currently costs less than 4% of that amount. This is because of a proposed change to the fees families must pay to administer the estate of…

  • Think tank proposes tax changes to save £7bn

    A think tank suggests that tightening up some existing wealth taxes and subsidies could help the Government save almost £7 billion a year by 2022/23. Scrapping the lifetime and help-to-buy ISAs, reforming or replacing council tax, and clamping down on inheritance tax loopholes are among the suggestions made by the Resolution Foundation. Other recommendations include…

  • Partners hit by avoidable ISA tax charge

    An unnecessary tax charge on inherited ISAs could be resulting in thousands of bereaved partners missing out on a tax break, according to research. Introduced in 2015, the additional permitted subscription is available to the spouse or civil partner of an ISA holder who has died. The subscription provides an extra ISA allowance to the…

  • Dual-registration service passes 200,000 milestone

    More than 200,000 startup owners have benefitted from a collaborative service that enables businesses to register for tax at the same time as registering their company. The streamlined company registration service, which was announced by HMRC and Companies House in 2015, was launched to reduce the burden on business owners and their agents. When a…

  • Auto-enrolment fines rise 146%

    Fines issued to employers that fail to comply with their auto-enrolment responsibilities have more than doubled over the last two years, a report from the Pensions Regulator shows. In 2017/18, there were 36,137 fines issued to employers for not complying with the requirements of auto-enrolment – up from 14,707 such penalties in 2016/17. The Pensions…