No evidence

The appellant company a builders filed its 2002 corporation tax return a month late. It showed chargeable profits of £20 000 but made it clear that this was estimated due to a data loss. It submitted a revised return in 2004 claiming a loss of over £70 000. HMRC opened an enquiry into the return and concluded that as the accounts were not reliable there being no supporting documents the only realistic action was to use the original estimated figure of profit as this was more consistent with earlier years' profits.

The company appealed.

The Special Commissioner said that the company had not shown that HMRC's amended figure was wrong or that another figure should be used. While the £20 000 figure was clearly not correct there was no evidence which could be used to provide the right one. It was hard...