I'm thinking of moving to Ireland

I'm thinking of moving to Ireland

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Last Wednesday I posted a letter to the Irish tax authority requesting a tax refund for a client. Today (Monday) we have received a letter confirming the refund is on its way! Whilst back home in the UK I'm still waiting for a partnership return I sent in on paper to show up as being received by HMRC. Then again, its only 5 weeks since I posted it.

Also, when we phoned the Irish Authority we were speaking to a real person within a minute.

Replies (12)

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Francois
By Francois Badenhorst
06th Jul 2015 16:05

My experience

I lived in Ireland for over a decade and I have to say my experience with the Irish tax authorities has always been positive. Very efficient. 

The Irish postal service is also bloody excellent. 

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Euan's picture
By Euan MacLennan
06th Jul 2015 16:51

You should report yourself

... for a breach of a basic community rule:

"Bad language will not be tolerated at all. If you can’t make a point without swearing, then please do not submit a post or comment."

;-)

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By Tim Vane
06th Jul 2015 17:26

Not fair to compare

Whilst I agree Revenue is very efficient (and provides excellent free software for online filing etc) it is not really fair to compare a body that has less than 6,000 staff in a country with less than 5 million inhabitants to HMRC, with around 70,000 staff and 65 million residents.

The tax collected per HMRC staff member is around double the tax collected per Revenue staff member.

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Replying to DJKL:
RLI
By lionofludesch
06th Jul 2015 20:21

Similar

Tim Vane wrote:

Whilst I agree Revenue is very efficient (and provides excellent free software for online filing etc) it is not really fair to compare a body that has less than 6,000 staff in a country with less than 5 million inhabitants to HMRC, with around 70,000 staff and 65 million residents.

Those ratios look pretty similar to me.

But setting that aside, if HMRC is understaffed, whose fault is that ?

Thanks (1)
Replying to tom123:
By johngroganjga
07th Jul 2015 10:02

Size

lionofludesch wrote:

Tim Vane wrote:

Whilst I agree Revenue is very efficient (and provides excellent free software for online filing etc) it is not really fair to compare a body that has less than 6,000 staff in a country with less than 5 million inhabitants to HMRC, with around 70,000 staff and 65 million residents.

Those ratios look pretty similar to me.

But setting that aside, if HMRC is understaffed, whose fault is that ?

I am sure Tim can speak for himself, but I suspect his point is not so much about the ratio but about the absolute size, and to do with the additional challenges of managing and controlling a necessarily much bigger organisation.

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Kieran Phelan
By KPEM online
06th Jul 2015 20:31

Ireland
The postal service manages to be better despite addresses as brief as "Mr Eugene O'Neill, [***], County Donegal".........

Revenue also allow offset of ALL taxes under 1 tax registration number. The equivalent would be allowing an individuals NI number to be used for SA, VAT, PAYE, CIS......... ingenious!!

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Sarah Douglas - HouseTree Business Ltd
By sarah douglas
07th Jul 2015 09:39

postal service

The postal service is good.   I sent a invitation to a friend in Dublin hoping she would get it which went like this as I could not remember the number of the house or exact location or not sure if she still lived there .

It went like this

xxxx Jones 

Take a right off Arnold Grove walk down and about 6 to 7  houses on your left and gave the shape of the Garden as I remembered it from 16 years old.  

She actually got it. 

My dad does his nut with me.   I always post to wrong house and wrong road and wrong number after they moved to a smaller house.   I did it with their commonwealth Games tickets for them and their friends , they still got the tickets. 

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RLI
By lionofludesch
07th Jul 2015 09:55

Foreign

A letter from Ireland to The North costs the same as a letter to Ireland.

Royal Mail reciprocate by charging a letter from The North to Ireland as a letter to Europe.

On the other hand, Royal Mail delivered a Christmas card to us last December addressed .....

"Mr and Mrs Lion

No 8"

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RLI
By lionofludesch
07th Jul 2015 10:56

Excuse?

I'm not sure that's an excuse.  If the service you're providing is understaffed, you need more staff.

There are plenty of posts on here suggesting where improvements could be made.

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By johngroganjga
07th Jul 2015 11:09

I was just clarifying what I thought Tim meant, because I thought you had misunderstood it. The point is Tim's not mine. I am not for a moment justifying or excusing HMRC's lamentable level of performance.

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RLI
By lionofludesch
07th Jul 2015 11:16

No problem, John.

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By Tim Vane
07th Jul 2015 11:44

Yes thanks John.

John was just clarifying the point that I tried to make yesterday that HMRC is more than 10 times the size of Irish Revenue and any comparison between the relative efficiencies of organisations of such vastly differing sizes is not necessarily a fair one.

Like John, I do not defend HMRC's appalling level of performance, but a better comparison would be between HMRC and its equivalents in Germany or France which presumably will be of a similar size (although I believe Germany has both state and federal tax authorities). I have no knowledge of the workings of either authority, but a former colleague tells me he dreads any contact with the French tax authorities, whom he refers to as the "despots".

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