As the host of a number of companies's Registered Offices it is clear that the ICO is sending out letters to every one as bait in 0rder to collect fees from the unwary.
I also got a follow up call on a Flat Management Company from a very pushy young man (who eventually agreed to Foxtrot Off). It beggars belief that the ICO thinks it has any business requiring people to pay to keep their OWN data!
All you lot moaning about the consequences of the Overlap Relief Time Bomb that you have had approximately 25 years to face up to and deal with
When I have raised it here before over the years, it was pooh-poohed, but it has always affected those who were forced to end their self employment (and the estates of those who died). Just in a piecemeal fashion.
Let's hope the Newspaper that picks up on this blames the accountants, not HMRC
I don't think that Tony's client has 'moved to MTD' without telling him - it seems that from this quarter (the first to commence after the deadline) all our clients for whom we previously filed on the 'old' agent account have been migrated. In practice for us it means logging in to our 'new' Agent Services Account, supplying the VAT number (there is no longer a handy client list) then typing in the nine boxes as before - no need for bridging software.
I believe that Tony is saying that he has the old style agent account but does not have a new one, and there is his problem because he cannot get that without the pesky MLR registration. In effect (but not I am sure by intent) it is a way for HMRC to get all agents into line on this.
Sounds like the only immediate alternative is for each client to get a Business Dashboard.
Let's not pile in too heavy on Tony - this is the way that 'digital' will come to bear on many in coming months and years, and it is for us to help them through it.
Slightly different circumstances from a few years ago, but concerning. Company client had to close immediately after being stiffed by a customer for £80,000. The Official Receiver agreed that this was the responsible thing to do and closed the matter. We understand they call it internally a 'dead box' case and I believe that they destroyed the records.
Some years later (just before the 6 year limit) a firm of ambulance chasing lawyers who claim to 'pierce the corporate veil on behalf of creditors' took the matter up "on behalf of the OR". I surmise that they had schmoozed the new head of the local office at a cocktail party. They accused the directors of having wrongly taken dividends "because they should have been aware of the Lehman Brothers case" - despite that fact that dividends were paid out of profits and the Balance Sheet was positive until the customer did a pre-pack administration. By threatening expensive legal action they blagged £25,000 out of our clients. I doubt if anything went to the creditors after their fees were paid.
As a happy Moneysoft user for some years, I bow to the technical knowledge being shown here - for instance I had no idea that if an employee was not paid for three months, HMRC would think that they had left! That has never seemed to happen when we file Nil for 11 months and then put in annual directors' pay for Month 12.
Could tdhuria confirm that he filed all the reports that Moneysoft suggested? We just load all the clients into its RTI batch processor and file whatever is requested. No problem.
We checked one of our employer clients which has Nil pay and the only EPS is at the beginning of the Tax Year, otherwise it is FPS every month. This sounds like tdhuria's experience.
Another, where there are no employees, gets an EPS every month.
A final word on Moneysoft. They have coped with everything that has been thrown at them in recent years without missing a beat. The interface looks a bit tired and we have to buy Parallels and use Windows to run on our Macs, but stick with Moneysoft because of the high level of trust. It seems unlikely that they would be in any way 'lazy' in their dealings with HMRC.
Who would bet that some low level HMRC employee knows more than Moneysoft about this issue?
My answers
As the host of a number of companies's Registered Offices it is clear that the ICO is sending out letters to every one as bait in 0rder to collect fees from the unwary.
I also got a follow up call on a Flat Management Company from a very pushy young man (who eventually agreed to Foxtrot Off). It beggars belief that the ICO thinks it has any business requiring people to pay to keep their OWN data!
As the others have said, we had to feel our way. It was quite a while ago, and my memory on the details is a little hazy.
I do remember having some screen shots from HMRC on a couple of occasions.
I have inherited such cases and dealt with them straight away !
These "Excess Profits" you refer to are the point! Being able to spread them may avoid Higher Rates but it is still an unexpected tax bill.
Where is my failure of imagination?
In my experience, HMRC don't have records of Overlap Relief if it has not been repeatedly entered on Returns (as it should have been)
Some years ago I think they had a 'clear out' of old data !
Here we go again
All you lot moaning about the consequences of the Overlap Relief Time Bomb that you have had approximately 25 years to face up to and deal with
When I have raised it here before over the years, it was pooh-poohed, but it has always affected those who were forced to end their self employment (and the estates of those who died). Just in a piecemeal fashion.
Let's hope the Newspaper that picks up on this blames the accountants, not HMRC
I don't think that Tony's client has 'moved to MTD' without telling him - it seems that from this quarter (the first to commence after the deadline) all our clients for whom we previously filed on the 'old' agent account have been migrated. In practice for us it means logging in to our 'new' Agent Services Account, supplying the VAT number (there is no longer a handy client list) then typing in the nine boxes as before - no need for bridging software.
I believe that Tony is saying that he has the old style agent account but does not have a new one, and there is his problem because he cannot get that without the pesky MLR registration. In effect (but not I am sure by intent) it is a way for HMRC to get all agents into line on this.
Sounds like the only immediate alternative is for each client to get a Business Dashboard.
Let's not pile in too heavy on Tony - this is the way that 'digital' will come to bear on many in coming months and years, and it is for us to help them through it.
Slightly different circumstances from a few years ago, but concerning. Company client had to close immediately after being stiffed by a customer for £80,000. The Official Receiver agreed that this was the responsible thing to do and closed the matter. We understand they call it internally a 'dead box' case and I believe that they destroyed the records.
Some years later (just before the 6 year limit) a firm of ambulance chasing lawyers who claim to 'pierce the corporate veil on behalf of creditors' took the matter up "on behalf of the OR". I surmise that they had schmoozed the new head of the local office at a cocktail party. They accused the directors of having wrongly taken dividends "because they should have been aware of the Lehman Brothers case" - despite that fact that dividends were paid out of profits and the Balance Sheet was positive until the customer did a pre-pack administration. By threatening expensive legal action they blagged £25,000 out of our clients. I doubt if anything went to the creditors after their fees were paid.
As a happy Moneysoft user for some years, I bow to the technical knowledge being shown here - for instance I had no idea that if an employee was not paid for three months, HMRC would think that they had left! That has never seemed to happen when we file Nil for 11 months and then put in annual directors' pay for Month 12.
Could tdhuria confirm that he filed all the reports that Moneysoft suggested? We just load all the clients into its RTI batch processor and file whatever is requested. No problem.
We checked one of our employer clients which has Nil pay and the only EPS is at the beginning of the Tax Year, otherwise it is FPS every month. This sounds like tdhuria's experience.
Another, where there are no employees, gets an EPS every month.
A final word on Moneysoft. They have coped with everything that has been thrown at them in recent years without missing a beat. The interface looks a bit tired and we have to buy Parallels and use Windows to run on our Macs, but stick with Moneysoft because of the high level of trust. It seems unlikely that they would be in any way 'lazy' in their dealings with HMRC.
Who would bet that some low level HMRC employee knows more than Moneysoft about this issue?
HARSH !