This week's opinion

I welcome HMRC’s relaxation of some of the compliance requirements for small business within VAT MOSS (tinyurl.com/rcb416). But those businesses should never have been caught up in MOSS in the first place. I doubt that any real consideration was given to micro businesses when the change to the place of supply rules for electronic services for VAT were being considered. The dominant voices would have been that of the major telecommunication broadcasting and internet business and of the officials dealing with them. There was not a deliberate decision to make life difficult for micro businesses: there appears to have been nobody at the table thinking about their interests.

This is a common problem. I know from many of the consultations I have been involved with over the years that it is incredibly difficult for the voice of the micro business to be heard. Many of these businesses have...