Appeal against penalties for late P35

The taxpayer had been late filing its PAYE employer end-of-year return P35 for 2008-09. As a result in September 2009 January and May 2010 HMRC imposed penalties totalling £1 200.

After being chased for payment by HMRC’s debt management in November 2019 the taxpayer applied to the First-tier Tribunal to make a late appeal on the basis that it was under the impression that the penalty had previously been appealed and removed. Indeed its adviser at the time assured them everything was in order. Further it had periodically over the past ten years received correspondence relating to this matter and each time it contacted HMRC to reiterate that this had been dealt with. The original adviser was no longer practising so there was no way of ascertaining if the P35 return had been submitted correctly. Finally the cumulative penalty of £1 200 was...