CIPP members will hopefully have noticed that the Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) has started a project looking at employee benefits and expenses (EBE for short). Details of the review, including the formal terms of reference for the project can be found at http://www.hm- treasury.gov.uk/ots_employee_benefits_expenses.htm . As with previous OTS projects, our aim is to look for the things that cause problems in practice – technical or administrative issues, matters that take too much time or cause uncertainty, or where the rules as they apply do not seem fair or reflect current working practices. We will go on to develop recommendations that we can put to the Chancellor that would simplify the system for users. In framing our recommendations, we have to bear in mind our brief to be broadly revenue neutral and we cannot promise that all our points will be taken up. But if we can show that there will be a real simplification dividend from any change, that will maximise the chance of getting improvements. Hence the importance of the first phase of our work – which is evidence gathering. We would welcome any comments and contributions from CIPP members, ideally setting out area(s) of difficulty and why there are problems. Actual examples of difficulty, excessive time taken etc. are very valuable to us. Our target is to produce an initial report on the problem areas we have identified at the start of August. We will then proceed with studies of specific areas and will be looking for the best ways to improve matters – so will be asking CIPP members for further input in due course.
Please send any contributions, however brief, to OTS-Employee.Benefits@ots.gsi.gov.uk John Whiting
Tax Director, OTS ots@ots.gsi.gov.uk
EMPLOYEE BENEFITS AND EXPENSES COMMITTEE MINUTES – 17 JUNE 2013
2 July 2013
HM Treasury and the Office of Tax Simplification have published the minutes from the Employee Benefits and Expenses committee meeting held 17 June 2013.
The minutes were taken at the meeting of the Employee Benefits and Expenses Committee 17 June 2013 and include a very long list of subjects that have been mentioned as possible areas needing review, improvement or simplification, the minutes report that the OTS team plan to publish a first draft of the interim report, during the week starting 5 August.
The OTS expects to agree with the Chancellor over the summer which areas to focus on for the second stage of the review.
OTS INTERIM REPORT ON EMPLOYEE BENEFITS AND EXPENSES
8 August 2013
As previously reported the Office for Tax Simplification (OTS) has been reviewing the tax rules around employee benefits and expense and an interim report has now been published.
It is of no surprise that the report has concluded that ‘the complex system for reporting and taxing employee benefits and expenses is ripe for a complete overhaul’.
The report identifies some ‘big picture’ issues for further study such as ‘payrolling’ of benefits, abolishing the £8,500 ‘higher paid’ threshold, and smoothing the differences between tax and national insurance rules.
CIPP Policy News Journal
16/04/2014, Page 40 of 519
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