Capital Gains Tax
The main rate of capital gains tax is 10 percent for basic rate taxpayers and 20 percent for higher rate taxpayers. In the event that the gain covers both tax bands then a combination of the two rates will be…
COP 8 & COP 9 Tax Investigations
HM Revenue and Customs may issue a COP 9 notice if they suspect a taxpayer of serious tax fraud. These investigations are generally opened if HM Revenue and Customs expect to recover taxes in excess of £75,000 and they are…
Due Diligence
When the shares in a company are acquired, the new owner acquires the company in its entirety including its history. As such, there is a greater commercial risk compared to simply acquiring an asset as the value of the company…
Employee Ownership Trusts
Introduced by the Government in 2014 to expand employee share participation, Employee Ownership Trusts (often referred to EOT’s) have become one of the most popular options for owners to secure a tax efficient exit from their business. Properly structured, the…
Enterprise Investment Scheme and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS)
EIS and SEIS provide generous tax reliefs for investors including income tax relief for the initial investment (30 percent for EIS investments and 50 percent for SEIS investments) and capital gains tax free disposals of the investment. These tax reliefs…
Enterprise Management Incentive Scheme (EMI)
The Enterprise Management Incentive scheme is a share option scheme which is approved by HM Revenue and Customs and enables share options to be granted to employees at the company’s discretion. Each employee who participates in the EMI scheme must…
Family Investment Companies
Family investment companies (often abbreviated to “FIC”) have become a popular inheritance tax planning tool in recent years. These normally have two classes of shares often called “frozen shares” and “growth shares”. Generally a family’s older generation can look to…
Inheritance Tax Planning
Generally speaking inheritance tax applies to the estate of a person who has died. Subject to some exceptions, there is no liability to pay if an estate has a value of £325,000 (the ‘nil rate band’) or if the estate…
Management Buy Out (MBO)
An MBO arrangement is a common vehicle used to pass a company over to its management team or, quite often, other family members working within the business. In general terms, an MBO arrangement will involve the incorporation of a new…
Patent Box
Patent Box is a valuable tax incentive which is intended to increase innovation by encouraging companies to turn their research and development into commercial products. It achieves this by applying a reduced corporation tax rate of 10 per cent to…