Offshore disclosure
The points below provide
an overview from HMRC on what you can expect from its new offshore disclosure plan:
- the New
Disclosure Opportunity (NDO) is for people with unpaid tax connected to an
offshore account and will run from the autumn 2009 until March 2010. It will
give the offshore account holders one final opportunity to disclose, and put
their affairs in order
- penalty of 10%
for full disclosure if no previous opportunity. Higher for full disclosure if
you had the chance under previous opportunity
- HMRC is seeking
to obtain details of offshore accounts and assets from hundreds of financial
institutions. This ensures HMRC will be able to pursue those who choose not to
disclose tax owed as quickly as possible
- during the
disclosure period, all account holders will know that HMRC has, or will soon
have, their details. We have already successfully applied to get details from a
number of banks
- although
offshore account structures can be complex, HMRC will make it as simple and
straightforward as possible for people to disclose
- in addition,
HMRC want to work with financial institutions and customer representative
bodies to further simplify the disclosure process.
If people do not disclose
- the NDO is a
final opportunity to disclose in advantageous circumstances - there will not be
another one
- anyone who has, or
thinks they have, unpaid tax connected to an offshore account, should not wait
for a further opportunity - it still makes sense to come forward now
- they will be
disappointed and face the likelihood of HMRC contacting them after the
disclosure window has closed. If there are unpaid liabilities, this will almost
certainly mean a higher penalty at the very least
- we have plans to
risk assess all information we receive and we will identify people who we
believe have undeclared liabilities but who have not disclosed through NDO
- we will use our
enquiry and inspection powers to approach customers in this group and we will
vigorously pursue all outstanding liabilities.
Once agreement has been reached
the full details of the latest offshore
disclosure campaign will be available on ACCA UK's website.
|
