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don't have any powers to deal with agents
I'd have thought that picking all the clients of a duff agent for investigation is pretty much going to wipe any agent out one way or another. If that ain't power what is????
Tom
ps loved the money laundering link so much I trawled through the manual looking for worse pages, and boy, there are loads. Sad or what!
An example of HMRC aiding it's "customers"
Following on from Viv's comment I thought the MLR might include disciplinary powers, but when I looked all I got was this:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/mlr1ppmanual/mlr1pp11160.htm
Very helpful.
What's the point in posting this?
Thanks Penny
We shall be hosting a page with the live webcast on at https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=199133&d=1025&h=1019&f=1026&dateformat=%25o%20%25B%20%25Y
and you can post questions into it both now and during the webcast.
I'm sure someone out there has something constructive to add to this debate - unless we can get involved rather than slinging rocks we are going to get what we deserve.
Viv - you say HMRC can get rid of bad agents now, they don't need new powers. Have I missed something important because I thought that was exactly the point of the consultation - that in reality they don't have any powers to deal with agents.....Can you tell me more?
working with agents
Rebecca.........you are making the mistake often made.......you are intellectualising the argument. Reality will be different. Once these people get big sticks they tend to use them indiscriminately. this re-assurance will boil down to the big firms being left alone whilst the smaller ones will take the brunt.......and god help the one man/woman bands. Sure rogue agents need to be driven out of the system, but that could be done NOW without any further legislation. I'm sorry but the touch of this Government is always about big sticks and legislation, they treat no one as responsible human beings and have acted this way, across all fronts for the past ten years. HMRC adopt their tactics....say one thing , do another, so whilst inviting SME's with cash flow problems to phone their special helpline on the one hand, they are putting in Debt Collectors at the same time. Where will intellectualising get you when the real battles begin ! ...humph! Viv O
I think I'm in credit by about 100
I see what you mean about the AIA example used where you could extrapolate one hastily done set of figures.
I would hate to think that they could come and look through all clients records based on this one mistake.
Only recently I received calcualtions for MCA that were all wrong. Would the same apply to the lady who wrote to me on that occasion? Will HMRC review her work in the area of MCA and look back and reverse the fortune she has inadvertantly saved HMRC at the expense of those individual tax payers?
Her mistake was coupled with non reply to letters, losing my client off of my list of clients, losing the 5 tax returns I personally handed in to my local tax office, getting the time wrong in the sense that they only initially allowed 4 of the 5 returns. Excessive time taken all round in this case. This is just one example of half a dozen mistakes occurring and a never ending slack attitude to time taken by HMRC.
I urge agents to hold on file their best examples of HMRC mistakes if we find ourselves on the other end of their powers.
I certainly do make mistakes but I do feel I should be allowed a few when I can show them what I am often faced with from them. If they can't set an example...?
What about HMRC mistakes?
I totally agree with Ronald Angus, and also regularly come across members of HMRC staff issuing incorrect calculations due to their lack of knowledge of the tax system. This is a particular issue at repayment offices, it seems. Common errors relate to age and married couples' allowances, gift aid, and anything foreign seems to fox them completely! Why is the work of these clearly ill-trained employees not checked before it leaves the building? And what action is taken when mistakes are pointed out by the profession? Anyone can make a mistake, and our system needs to reflect this. However, HMRC commonly seem to take the view that mistakes are only ever made outside of their organisation, whereas those of us on the receiving end of the papers they issue know otherwise.
Trust?
"We shall have to take on trust the fact that HMRC are not intending to use the powers against agents when it is not appropriate to do so "
Sorry Rebecca - given HMRC's history on this, NO CAN DO.
HMRC's whole approach is to hit the easy targets - in this case those of us who they feel can't afford expensive barristers to take them all the way through the courts.
If their proposal is to weed out the bad agents, why is the consultation not aimed at that issue instead of giving them sweeping new powers which are wholly excessive and inappropriate?
In any event the tax return factories will continue to exist - they will just modify their form to whatever shape works under the 'new' system.
All I can see happening from this is a massive rise in PII insurance for everyone concerned.
AIA
It would help small one man agents like me if HMRC had a better information system. I assume that AIA does not apply to employees who claim capital allowances. For confirmation I searched the HMRC website and the annual manual sent to agents in vain and I then phoned HMRC. No-one was able to give me an answer but I was told a technician would phone me within a rather long period of time.
(perhaps 48 hours bit it might have been longer)
Someone did eventually phone me when I was out without leaving an answer to the query on my answering machine. By then the need for an answer was past but I still don't know it for certain. If AIA is such an important benefit to working people why can't one easily find on the HMRC website or in their manuals to whom and to what exactly the relief applies ?
One sided
I think I have to agree with the majority of the posts on here that these proposed powers are way over the top, without safeguards and very one-sided.
From my dealings with HMRC their staff have made at least 10 errors to every 1 I have made, probably more and I'm not exaggerating.
Under it's current leadership and pressure from the treasury I absolutely cannot trust HMRC not to wield these powers like a big stick against the smallest and least able to defend themselves.
In my view this consultation document is not fit for purpose and should be torn up, let them start again on a fresh sheet of paper and this time pay us a little respect, after all we do most of their work in collecting taxes for them.
But thinking about mistakes I would draw on my auditing background. If I was HMIT and found an agent had wrongly claimed say AIA on a car, the first thing I would do would be to select a few more of that agent's clients with relatively high capital allowances and ask to see those capital allowance calculations too. It's simple risk based sample auditing and if their centralised risk management function cannot cope with feedback from individual HMRC officers, then they are missing a trick. Surely they don't need any additional legislation to do that?
Surely they already have the power to target more enquiries at agents who have made more mistakes in the past, surely that is, or could be, part of their risk based approach to selecting returns for enquiry? If an agent is consistently making mistakes then a massive increase in the number of his clients being selected for enquiry would soon either put him out of business or teach him the merits of CPD and honesty.
As for the rest of us that do it honestly and get it right 99 times out of 100 give us some respect, and maybe even thank us for getting the majority of taxpayers to pay the right amount of tax at the right time. There is no need to stand over us with a big stick waiting to pounce on the first honest mistake.
Steve
AIA for employees
Just for info to the previous poster - AIA is available to employees - see HMRC Help Sheet 206.