New approach to tax penalties for the deceased
Can HMRC charge the deceased tax penalties? This is a question which crops up from time to time as a tax return still has to be prepared up to the date of the death of a taxpayer, and HMRC may not only instigate an enquiry into that return but can also make a discovery into previous returns.
Continued...
The full article is available to registered AccountingWEB members only. To read the rest of this article you’ll need to login or register.
Registration is FREE and allows you to view all content, ask questions, comment and much more.
Or if you are already registered, login here
HMRC cave in
Following the article, I wrote to SCI claiming a refund of £15961.35. I have just received a response saying that HMRC ''now accepts that its policy of seeking such penalties from the executors of deceased taxpayers is incompatible with the Human Rights Act''.
They are deducting the extra inheritance tax from the repayment, but this will still leave the estate some £9500 better off. The question is, when HMRC gave the undertaking to repay if their interpretation was incorrect, I was under the impression that all taxpayers who were awaiting this decision were put on a list and would be notified of the ruling! This does not seem to be happening. How many more are there out there who are unaware of the ruling?
Mark Lee has pointed out that this is not the first time this un
In 'Taxline' of February this year Jan Tish wrote that she had received a letter from HMRC confirming that there had indeed been a policy change. The question of a change to the Enquiry Manual was flagged in her Taxline piece.
There is something slightly odd here.. When did this change happen ,and why was it not formally announced as a change ?-indeed it still has not been.