News

The planned devolution of tax powers to Scotland could result in a broad swathe of unintended complexities, including forcing many more taxpayers into self assessment, according to the Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT).

Tax credits

Revenue and Customs Brief 7 (2015) explains the new rules for self-employed people who claim the working tax credit.

Disregard Regulations

Guidance is available on deciding to elect in to the Disregard Regulations (SI 2004/3256) for hedging of derivative contracts.

Parliament decided not to legislate for the proposed exemption to income tax for trivial benefits in kind.

The decision was made to enable the swift enactment of Finance (No 2) Bill, meaning the exemption will not come into force from 6 April as originally planned.

The measure would have exempted small benefits of up to £50 as long as they were not in recognition of services, part of a contractual obligation, or made in conjunction with a salary sacrifice arrangement.

HMRC have issued Revenue and Customs Brief (RCB) 8 (2015) to expand on their stance on the deduction of VAT on pension fund management costs.

Digital accounts will reduce the administrative burden of tax currently faced by millions of individuals and small businesses, according to the financial secretary to the Treasury, David Gauke.

PAC also critical of reliefs cost data

Toolkits

HMRC have updated two agent toolkits – National Insurance contributions and statutory payments, and expenses and benefits from employment – to include 2014/15 employers’ end-of-year forms and recordkeeping information for 2015/16.

HMRC plan to publish new pensions guidance in draft form in early spring. The Pensions Tax Manual (PTM) will replace the current Registered Pension Schemes Manual (RPSM).

The transition of Revenue pensions content to GOV.UK means some RPSM guidance aimed at scheme members and their advisers, employers and scheme administrators appears on the pension pages of the government web hub.

Annuities; expenses; VAT

Plan revived to tackle offshore evasion

Revenue Scotland

The Low Incomes Tax Reform Group has welcomed Revenue Scotland’s draft charter of standards and value, which was offered for consultation following extensive informal discussion in late 2014, during which the LITRG said the obligations of taxpayer and tax authority should be set out separately, to make it clear that the performance of Revenue Scotland’s duties under the charter should not be conditional upon taxpayers meeting their obligations, and vice versa.

Finance Bill

The Finance Bill will be published on Tuesday 24 March.

Tax advisers are being invited to share their views on prototype pages of HMRC’s planned agent online self-serve (AOSS) offering.

The Revenue has published a series of screenshots, which show what agents might do to confirm their client lists are accurate and how they could view the PAYE accounts of employer clients.