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Employer Bulletin 41 has been published; extracts follow.
In-year penalties
The legislation for in-year PAYE penalties is included in FA 2009, Sch 56. The regime started in April 2010 and some penalties have been challenged in the First-tier Tribunal.
In Agar Ltd (TC1625), the judge decided that HMRC had no legal right to charge a penalty for late payment of month 12 as the payment is due by 22 April in the following tax year.
HMRC have accepted this decision and have started to amend 2010/11 notices to remove any penalties for month 12.
Employers need take no action as HMRC will be writing to every affected employer with details of their revised penalty and, where appropriate, will refund any sums overpaid. HMRC hope to complete this process by the end of May.
End-of-year returns
In a change to previous practice, HMRC will issue a letter to employers at the beginning of May to remind them about the deadline for filing their employer annual return.
A reminder letter will be issued after the filing deadline if the department has not received a return or a ‘no annual return’ notification. This will explain that a penalty may already have been incurred and that the return should be submitted immediately to avoid the penalty increasing.
Employers who need to send in further information after they have submitted their original return, have to submit another one.
Some software will not support the submission of an additional return, in which case employers can use HMRC’s online service. This software should be used for submissions with up to 50 P14s.
It should not be used to submit a P35 without any forms P14. If either of these situations arises, the employer should contact the online service helpdesk.
Business tax dashboard
From mid-April 2012, employers who have registered and enrolled for HMRC online services can create an online business tax dashboard. This will enable them to see a summary of their tax position on a single screen.
For each tax displayed on the dashboard the employer can navigate, using the links, to view account information such as payments and repayments. The dashboard also features a facility to check and change some of the contact details that HMRC hold for the business.
Employers can enrol for the dashboard service when they log in to an HMRC online service that contains a corporation tax or self-assessment record. The dashboard will then be added to the list of services they use on the ‘your HMRC services’ page.
Businesses which use the same user ID and password to access PAYE and VAT as they use for corporation tax (or self assessment), will get the full benefit of a business tax dashboard as it will show all three.
PAYE code enquiries
Given that some employees prefer their employer to handle any queries about their PAYE notice of coding, HMRC confirm that they will speak to an employer about certain aspects of an employee’s tax code if the employee:
- is present for the call;
- can verify their identity to HMRC; and
- confirms that he is content for the employer to represent him during that call.
