HMRC Targeting TV Presenters with PAYE and NIC Demands

HMRC is understood to be targeting television presenters and their personal service companies in relation to money it believes could be owed in relation to unpaid PAYE and National Insurance Contributions (NICs).

The presenter on the daytime TV show Loose Women, Kaye Adams, recently won a tax tribunal case against HMRC in which over £100,000 was being demanded in relation to PAYE and NICs.

However, emerging reports from accountants suggest that there could be a concerted effort being made by HMRC to make similar demands of many other freelance TV presenters.

Writing on Accounting Web, tax expert Rebecca Cave recently said that BBC presenters are coming under considerable scrutiny in relation to their tax affairs and the positions of the personal service companies they set up in order to operate more easily on a freelance basis.

The claims being made on the part of HMRC are understood to be essentially that personal service companies in these contexts often don’t operate PAYE on deemed salary payments as are due under IR35 rules.

TV presenters, including Lorraine Kelly and Christa Ackroyd, have already been subject to HMRC action in relation to alleged breaches of IR35 rules.

Ms Kelly, who has been appearing on morning television shows in the UK for decades, was successfully defended in a case against HMRC earlier this year on the basis that IR35 rules did not apply in the context of her work and provision of services to the TV company ITV.

However, Ms Ackroyd, formerly a presenter of the BBC programme ‘Look North’, lost her appeal against an HMRC claim that her company should be liable for a £420,000 bill for income tax and NICs between 2006/7 and 2012/13.

PAYE regulations allow for HMRC to issue determinations to employers to inform them of circumstances in which PAYE should apply.

Letters to that effect are referred to as ‘regulation 80’ notices and they are usually accompanied by details of where NICs are also due.

Determinations that certain situations fall under the remit of IR35 rules and regulation 80 notices can be challenged and potentially overturned at tax tribunals.