Deduction of trust management expenses

KEY POINTS

• General principles underlying deduction of trust expenses.
• A summary of the position for different types of trust.
• The Lord Chetwode decision was that no trust management expenses are deductible from income taxed on the settlor.
• The STEP standard provisions.
• HMRC guidance and record-keeping advice.

A short item on a students’ page in the first issue of Taxation covered trust management expenses. It said simply that where the will or settlement deed does not expressly state that trust expenses should be applied against income to any extent then income of the beneficiaries from the trust is their proportion of the income received before any such deductions are made.

I must confess that had I been asked what the position was I might have given a different answer. In my experience there...