New guidance as trust registration deadline looms
In recent weeks, there has been a flurry of new guidance added to HMRC’s Trust Registration Service manual. With the deadline for registration looming, Helen Thornley looks at the highlights from these latest changes.
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A useful collation at this very late stage, but if ...
'HMRC advises that trustees of non-taxable trusts with old or dormant UTRs can interpret the question as referring to current tax liabilities only, and so can answer “no” if the UTR is currently dormant and the trust is currently non-taxable'
... how is this 'advice' being communicated?
Is the wording in guidance & forms to be changed? And, if so, when?
So if we know the answer is "yes" HMRC's advice is to answer "no". Can we use this logic elsewhere in dealings with HMRC?
On Penalties
"Reg 76.—(1) Paragraph (2) applies if [HMRC or the FCA] is satisfied that any person (“P”) has contravened a relevant requirement imposed on that person.
(2) [HMRC or the FCA] may do one or both of the following—
(a)impose a penalty of such amount as it considers appropriate on P;
(b)publish a statement censuring P."
The words "of such amount as it considers appropriate on P" suggests to me that HMRC (or the FCA) must have the object, all sublime, to make the punishment fit the crime.
To state in their manual that either there is no penalty or a penalty of £5K for late registration before regard to the facts of a case other than the (alleged) deliberate nature of the lateness seems unlawful. Nought to £5K seems too fantastic a rate of acceleration, especially when compared to the penalties for tardiness in filing SA returns. The £5K applies regardless of the size of the trust fund or the risk that the delay might have hindered the bringing of money launderers to book, so some Ps might have got off lightly with a £5K fine. But IANAL.