A probe into a financial advisory firm has found it made misleading claims on its website related to tax planning.

The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld three complaints from HMRC against Williams Gordon Ltd of Egham, Surrey.

HMRC challenged a number of claims on Williams Gordon’s website, saying they were misleading.
One stated: “Take home up to 92% of your pay’ and ‘you receive a monthly market rate gross salary equivalent payment, that will be subject to tax and NI deductions.”

Tax officials said Williams Gordon’s arrangement “did not comply with standard income tax and national insurance payments and could therefore be challenged by HMRC”.

Williams Gordon argued, however, that HMRC had “knowingly based their complaint on a number of assumptions and did not consider that HMRC’s understanding was correct.”

HMRC also flagged up the claims that, “we are fully compliant with the necessary HMRC legislation and all current IR35 policies.” The taxman complained over the ad which stated: “We also ensure that you remain tax compliant for the duration of the contract” and “not only providing the highest return, but doing so in a legal, robust, documented and defendable way”.

Williams Gordon stated they would amend their website to read “compliant with all UK tax legislation”, which they maintained they were. They stated they were not aware of any charges arising from HMRC enquiries and did not believe they had any obligation to discuss the disguised remuneration scheme.

The third complaint surrounded Corporation Tax planning to Limited Company Owners. The promotion on the adviser firm’s website stated: “We can help if you have an overdrawn Directors loan account and want to negate the tax liability on this. We can also help if your current year’s Profits will be liable to Corporation Tax and you want to reduce/not incur the tax. Our product combines Corporation Tax Relief, with non-taxable personal payment.”

HMRC said this was “misleading because the ad did not make clear that was a scheme of avoidance and that users would be challenged by HMRC to establish that the ‘non-taxable personal payment’ was taxable”.

But Williams Gordon argued that they did not meet the Disclosure of Tax Avoidance Schemes (DOTAS) hallmarks. They provided documentation which they stated was confirmation from HMRC that the required level of hallmarks did not apply to an arrangement which was identical to theirs in respect of DOTAS issues.

In concluding that all three complaints by HMRC should be upheld, the ASA said: “The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Williams Gordon Ltd to ensure they held sufficient evidence for their claims and to disclose any relevant information in their advertising, such as the implications or risks of entering into a financial arrangement, including a challenge to a user’s tax arrangements by HMRC and the charges which might apply.”