Advice needed - HMRC offshore tax - threatening letter

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DH has received a very unwelcome and aggressive letter from the HMRC offshore team.

Without going into too much detail, do we need a tax lawyer or a tax accountant to help us deal with this?

It depends. Has he done anything wrong?

Um, yes, probably. Without my knowledge, but that is another thread.

I would start with an accountant at an ICAEW firm, biggish, say top 25 ish, to make sure they are of a size to have an expert who can help you.

They are quite putative with offshore misdemeanours eg penalties of 100%, but if you speak to someone who knows what they are doing they can help you mitigate this as far as possible.

Thanks very much.

You do NOT need the services of a big firm to deal with a standard tax matter : that is throwing good money after bad.

If he is self employed / runs a business, talk to your existing accountant and ask for their recommended offshore expert

If he is an employee, talk to the FD of the firm and see who is advising all those caught in whichever version of the swoop HMRC are ranting about at the moment.

I don't you can call offshore disclosure standard!

www.gov.uk/government/news/hmrc-campaign-targets-offshore-account-holders-in-fresh-clamp-down-on-tax-evasion
its all hot air
the accountancy press have been chuckling about it for ages

I agree you don't need a top 25 firm but you do need someone who knows how to deal with a) offshore investments/income and b) HMRC.

My employer is nowhere near top 25 in size and I've dealt with these issues for some of our clients. So I'd say the advice from TalkinPeace is good - talk to his current accountant if he has one and take it from there.

Thanks everyone.

He is going to talk to his accountants first and discuss next steps, and with their help figure out what the next steps are.

Needless to say this is not doing my blood pressure any good.