Stamp Duty Land Tax

Diffy55

Hi, I have now had 3 letters from HMRC regarding non payment of land tax when I moved.  I know my solicitor paid and have evidence of such which has been forwarded to HMRC but they so far have declined to even acknowledge it.  I have written to HMRC three times and my solicitor has contacted them too but they are still saying they have not received the funds and are now commencing 'recovery proceedings' which I take to mean sending the heavies round.  I have tried contacting their helpline, only to be told I need the account details from which the sum was paid.  Clearly I don't have those, as they are my solicitor's which they will not pass on to me.  I have written again to my solicitor, asking him to contact HMRC about this and also to my MP asking for help but otherwise I have no idea what to do.  The money WAS paid by my solicitor, HMRC says it wasn't.  It also now appears I will have to pay the interest being accrued on this sum which is totally unfair.  Can anyone advise me of anything else I can do?  Thank you

marcia_

 Have you raised a formal written complaint to the solicitors firm? 

user1977

The solicitors should be sorting this out, not you.

HMRC are not likely to waste their time "sending the heavies" round to you (except as a last resort) - they know fine well that (as is normal) the solicitors had the money and were meant to deal with payment - sorting out "missing" payments between them isn't for you to get involved in.

stig

Can I ask what the evidence is that your solicitor has paid over the SDLT to HMRC? Doesn’t this show the payment detail including payer account? Or is it more of a “yes we’ve paid it” assurance?

the most likely situation is that HMRC have misallocated the payment - particularly if your solicitor submitted several SDLT returns and made combined payment for these, meaning that there isn’t an incoming payment matching the liability exactly sitting in a ‘pending’ account somewhere.

in terms of resolving this, the first port of call should be with your solicitor. You gave the tax due to them and paid them to hand it over - it’s for them to demonstrate that they have in fact done so in the face of HMRC’s allegation that it wasn’t paid. They should be very keen to clear this up themselves, as taking the money from you and not handing it over would be professional negligence, at best.

However in law the tax liability remains with you, as you are finding.

Ultimately you need to establish

1. The solicitor paid over your money to HMRC,

2. The solicitor didn’t make a mistake in the information they gave HMRC to link the  payment to the transaction.

And you’ll then be in a position to evidence to HMRC that the bill was paid.

and if it does turn out to be a mistake by HMRC, request a payment in compensation for their mistake!

Diffy55

marcia_ said:

 Have you raised a formal written complaint to the solicitors firm? 

No, my solicitor has assured me it has been paid and I do absolutely trust him.  I believe the error lies within HMRC

Diffy55

user1977 said:

The solicitors should be sorting this out, not you.

HMRC are not likely to waste their time "sending the heavies" round to you (except as a last resort) - they know fine well that (as is normal) the solicitors had the money and were meant to deal with payment - sorting out "missing" payments between them isn't for you to get involved in.

Thank you, yes, I agree but I'm the one getting the letters.  

canaldumidi

Diffy55 said:

marcia_ said:

 Have you raised a formal written complaint to the solicitors firm? 

No, my solicitor has assured me it has been paid and I do absolutely trust him.  I believe the error lies within HMRC

Not good enough. You need evidence ie the solicitor's payment to HMRC details, reference to your tranaction etc.

Diffy55

stig said:

Can I ask what the evidence is that your solicitor has paid over the SDLT to HMRC? Doesn’t this show the payment detail including payer account? Or is it more of a “yes we’ve paid it” assurance?

the most likely situation is that HMRC have misallocated the payment - particularly if your solicitor submitted several SDLT returns and made combined payment for these, meaning that there isn’t an incoming payment matching the liability exactly sitting in a ‘pending’ account somewhere.

in terms of resolving this, the first port of call should be with your solicitor. You gave the tax due to them and paid them to hand it over - it’s for them to demonstrate that they have in fact done so in the face of HMRC’s allegation that it wasn’t paid. They should be very keen to clear this up themselves, as taking the money from you and not handing it over would be professional negligence, at best.

However in law the tax liability remains with you, as you are finding.

Ultimately you need to establish

1. The solicitor paid over your money to HMRC,

2. The solicitor didn’t make a mistake in the information they gave HMRC to link the  payment to the transaction.

And you’ll then be in a position to evidence to HMRC that the bill was paid.

and if it does turn out to be a mistake by HMRC, request a payment in compensation for their mistake!

Thank you for your reply, very useful.

The only evidence I have is the completion statement which includes the subtraction for stamp duty.  Unfortunately no detail of the bank account number.

I agree, I believe the payment has been lost within the HMRC system somewhere.

I have been told directly by him that the tax was paid.  I have that in writing and I totally trust him.

I will contact him again and check these details to make sure everything is ok from our side, thanks for that advice.

Can but try for compensation 🙈 but they'll probably ignore that like they have ignored everything else so far!!

Many thanks

hazyjo

Get paper evidence. Not all are honorable. I used a recommended, reputable firm in Brentwood and narrowly missed my stamp duty not being paid in 2013 when I moved house.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-25428757

Diffy55

hazyjo said:

Get paper evidence. Not all are honorable. I used a recommended, reputable firm in Brentwood and narrowly missed my stamp duty not being paid in 2013 when 

Wow!!  Shocking isn't it!

hazyjo

Diffy55 said:

hazyjo said:

Get paper evidence. Not all are honorable. I used a recommended, reputable firm in Brentwood and narrowly missed my stamp duty not being paid in 2013 when 

Wow!!  Shocking isn't it!

I found out by chance years later. Was looking them up to recommend to someone on here looking for solicitors in that area!