Corporation Tax issues

Savvy_Sue

DS1 has his Ltd Co registered at our address, because he was nomadic until a couple of years ago. We open his post and scan it for him.

He has an accountant, and business is going well.

However, over the last few months, there have been several letters from HMRC saying Corporation Tax is due. And DS1 has said
- the accountant is on it
- the accountant says it's not owed, he's dealing with it
- the accountant says it's not owed, he's dealing with it, but he can only communicate with HMRC by post

Now, it's that last one which is intriguing me, so are there any accountants out there who can confirm or deny that?

AND the letters are becoming more urgent - no interest being levied yet, but debt collectors are mentioned.
- Would DS1 be able to call HMRC and dispute the debt, if his accountant cannot?
- Would it make sense for DS1's company to pay it and get it back in due course? I'm confident that would be possible.

Any other suggestions?

Sandtree

Never had an issue with corporation tax so it may be there is a difference but certainly when I made a mistake and paid my VAT monies due into the HMRC's PAYE account using my PAYE ref I called HMRC and emailed my accountant at the same time. Before I'd even got through to an agent I had an email back from our accountant saying they'd spoken to them, it'll be moved across and will show within 3-5 working days.

Presumably your son has given the accountant all the necessary permissions to act as their agent with HMRC?

Savvy_Sue

I'm sure he thinks he has.

I always thought agents had easier access than we mere mortals ...

Pennywise

Savvy_Sue said:

I'm sure he thinks he has.

I always thought agents had easier access than we mere mortals ...

No, agents don't have easier access.  We have to generally phone the same numbers and get stuck in the same queues to talk to the same call centre staff.  There are "some" dedicated agent phone lines but since covid, they have either been scrapped or suffer the same long queues and put you through to the same call centre staff.  There are VERY few dedicated agent phone lines that actually connect you relatively quickly to specialist/senior HMRC staff these days, and only for specific reasons.

By the sounds of it, it could be due to a loss relief claim from a later year (i.e. loss carry back) which is very common at the moment due to covid related trading losses.  Trouble is that the debt collection side of HMRC can only work with what's on the computer screen, but loss relief claims (& amended corporation tax returns) are taking months for HMRC to process which they claim can't be expedited so it's just a matter of waiting for HMRC staff to process and update their systems.  I've still got a couple of amended corporation tax returns back from early 2020 which havn't been processed/updated by HMRC and they just ignore reminders/phone calls etc.  Unfortunately, the debt collectors aren't as relaxed and continue to try to collect what their systems show is due.

Savvy_Sue

Thanks, that's really helpful, I shall show him what you've said, he may know why the money's not owed (I'm not sure how much he was affected by covid but I suspect the company's income / profits / expenses do fluctuate quite a lot from year to year depending on what projects he is working on). 

So, the next question: reading the letter it seems it has not yet gone to debt collection, but if he doesn't contact them or pay, then that's what they'll do. At what point do we need to be concerned about that threat? There's nowt for them here (unless you count some old school exercise books? which I have not yet found the heart to throw away): from the company point of view it is just the registered address. If he phones and says "my accountant says I don't owe this money, so I'm neither paying nor making arrangements to do so" will that help at all, or not make a blind bit of difference?