HMRC to clamp down on electronic sales suppression

New legislation will be introduced to make offences of the possession making supplying and promotion of electronic sales suppression (ESS) software or hardware.

In addition new specific information powers will allow HMRC to obtain details of those involved in the supply of ESS software and hardware. They will also allow HMRC to obtain details of developers’ source code and the structure of data within an electronic point of sale (EPOS) system.

The measure tackles the form of tax evasion known as ESS. This is when a business deliberately manipulates its electronic sales records to hide or reduce the value of individual transactions to reduce the recorded turnover of the business and the corresponding tax liabilities while providing what appears to be a credible and compliant audit trail.

Given that there was a call for evidence on ESS between 19 December 2018 and 20 March...