Previous employer didn't register me as an employee to HMRC?

luckystargirl

Hey all, first time poster here, hoping I could get some advice:

I'm a bartender and worked at my last job between 2017-2018. I received payslips for the first few months but then all employees stopped receiving payslips. Months had gone by still with no payslips we were continuously fobbed off with more excuses.
Other employees had expressed to management that they were worried their income tax wasn't being deducted but were told that they were. As we didn't receive payslips, we couldn't be sure that we were being taxed correctly or not.

I logged into my government gateway today and found that there is no information available for the year of full-time work that I did there after we stopped receiving payslips. It reads like I just stopped working there but i have the bank transactions from the company to my account to prove I was paid a full time wage.
My girlfriend seems to think something dodgy was going on and that I need to tell HMRC but I don't know how/why it would benefit the company to not have me registered as an employee to HMRC? And what should I do about this, if anything? I never received a rebate and also didn't ever receive a P60 or P45 from this company, if this helps. :cool:

System

> but I don't know how/why it would benefit the company to not have me registered as an employee to HMRC?

They evade employers national insurance, roughly equivalent to 11% of your wage above £138 a week.

agrinnall

Your girlfriend is right, you should report the company to HMRC.


https://www.gov.uk/report-cash-in-hand-pay

Exodi

Assuming your employer has decided to pretend you stopped working Aug 17 and has not been paying tax since then - there will also be the issue of settling this unpaid tax, i'd imagine this will fold the business.

I'd imagine they were paying you deducting 'tax' as it makes no sense why they'd commit tax fraud but pass the proceeds to their unknowing employees so I shouldn't expect you'd be expected to make up the difference.

Report it

luckystargirl

If we were put down as 'freelancers' (when we definitely weren't, we were 100% treated as full-time staff and signed full-time contracts) would that get me in trouble with the law in terms of tax avoidance? As we never received payslips I can't be sure, but I always got paid my wage per hour multiplied by the hours I worked each week, so I don't think tax was deducted even though we were told it was.

In saying that, if we were down as freelancers, wouldn't that mean my income would show on the government gateway? I'm so confused haha

luckystargirl

>> Your girlfriend is right

She usually is!

phillw

luckystargirl wrote: »

As we never received payslips I can't be sure, but I always got paid my wage per hour multiplied by the hours I worked each week, so I don't think tax was deducted even though we were told it was.

If you never received payslips or a P60, then it's going to be difficult to prove why you thought tax was deducted.

Certainly if a job is advertised at £10 an hour, and you work 10 hours and get £100 then you should assume tax hadn't been deducted as employers don't advertise pay after tax (simply because your personal tax code will affect how much tax they need to deduct).

How much tax/ni you've paid could affect some future benefits claims and pension eligibility.

luckystargirl

I'm totally happy to pay whatever unpaid tax may be due from me, suppose I'm worried about the current employees as well who think they're paying tax when they're just racking up more and more unpaid tax that they will have to pay when I report the company. I know it's the morally right thing to do and I will report it, but I'm worried about the fallout for others. And as another commenter said above, how would it benefit the company to commit tax fraud and give us the proceeds? I don't have any knowledge of an employer's legal responsibilities when it comes to this sort of thing.


I also have evidence that I brought my concerns to the company about tax not being deducted and them saying that it was because I was on the wrong tax code, if this helps.

Exodi

Your posts worry me if you were taking home your hourly wage x hours worked as this indicates you've paid no tax from Aug 17 - Nov 18 and as phillw said, it would be hard to argue that you thought you had.

I'd be wary you may be due a massive tax bill.

If you earned over £162 a week you would owe national insurance and if you earned over £11500 in the year you owe income tax.

Exodi

luckystargirl wrote: »

I'm totally happy to pay whatever unpaid tax may be due from me, suppose I'm worried about the current employees as well who think they're paying tax when they're just racking up more and more unpaid tax that they will have to pay when I report the company. I know it's the morally right thing to do and I will report it, but I'm worried about the fallout for others. And as another commenter said above, how would it benefit the company to commit tax fraud and give us the proceeds? I don't have any knowledge of an employer's legal responsibilities when it comes to this sort of thing.


I also have evidence that I brought my concerns to the company about tax not being deducted and that it was because I was on the wrong tax code, if this helps.

Well I guess technically they would avoid paying employer national insurance contributions but as I said before, it seems nonsensical to pass 'most' of the proceeds of tax fraud to the employees. They may not even be aware of what they're doing.

It doesn't help, if anything it makes it worse that you were (and are) aware you haven't been paying tax for the duration of your employment.

luckystargirl

Well this can't be good. We were always being told that they were sorting our payslips for us, at one point saying that the file containing our payslips was too large to download and send out to everyone (?) and also that there had been a change of accountants which delayed payslips. All other employees think they are paying tax, I only worked it out when I got a pay increase and I was being paid more than I thought I should be. Brought the issue to my employer and they actually laughed and said 'of course you're paying tax!' Very, very worried about this now