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The taxpayers were a married couple who bought a property on 4 April 2014. Their solicitor filed the stamp duty land tax (SDLT) return on 30 April and submitted a cheque for the tax due. The deadline for receipt was 4 May.

The solicitor did complete box four and HMRC returned the document on 6 May. The corrected form was filed six days later. The Revenue imposed a £100 late-submission penalty.

The taxpayers appealed saying that the tax department could have rung their solicitor to obtain the missing information before the deadline allowing the return to be resubmitted in time.

The First-tier Tribunal noted that Revenue processing centre employees were not qualified to telephone taxpayers or their advisers – and it was “perfectly reasonable for HMRC to have automated systems” to process SLDT returns with the result that documents that required action had to be forwarded...