HMRC have recently won a legal case against Hyrax Resourcing Ltd a tax avoidance scheme promoter. This success is looking to help the tax authority collect over £40 million in unpaid taxes by demanding the promoter to disclose information of their scheme and details of individuals who were involved.
Hyrax Resourcing was promoting a disguised remuneration avoidance scheme, in which they paid scheme users minimum wage and paid the rest of their income in loans to avoid paying the National Insurance and Income Tax on their earnings.
Scheme users paid Hyrax 18% promoter fees to allow them to access the scheme which paid employees and transferred loan agreements to offshore trusts.
They achieved this by not declaring the money they received from the loan agreements as income on the scheme users tax returns, therefore they did not pay tax on any of their earnings.
Further information on this case can be found here
Are you using a scheme like this or an arrangement that is similar?
- If you are using a scheme like this, HMRC heavily recommends that you withdraw from the arrangement and settle your tax affairs.
- Doing this will help you to avoid the costs of litigation and investigation as well as reducing the interest and penalty charges (where applicable) from the tax you should have been paying. The penalty for failing to disclose a scheme is £5,000 per client, as well as £5,000 per day for not fully disclosing the scheme.
Why these schemes and arrangements should not be used:
- Fees paid towards the pay administration and promoters cannot be recovered.
- Any outstanding loan balance will be subject to charge, therefore you are still liable for these loan charges.
For more information on loan schemes please follow the link here.
