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MIKE TRUMAN looks at the recent case of Neil Martin Ltd v HMRC and asks when taxpayers can claim damages for Revenue delays and mistakes
KEY POINTS
- Claiming damages from HMRC is hard but Neil Martin Ltd shows it is possible in limited circumstances.
- Failure to process a CIS application in good time creates no statutory duty.
- If there is no statutory duty there can very rarely be a direct common law duty of care either.
- Employees in their ordinary work do not have a common law duty of care.
- However in assuming an authority to complete an application for the company an Inland Revenue employee had assumed a duty of care.
Clients will often complain bitterly that mistakes by HMRC may cost them a lot of money and say that they want to sue. Advisers then normally explain gently that you can't get damages from HMRC because the law makes no provision for it....
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