In P Higgs and Others v HMRC [2020] UKFTT 117 (TC) (24 February) the FTT decided that it had no jurisdiction to consider whether the appellants were entitled to a PAYE credit against income tax on employment income in a case where no PAYE had been deducted.
The appellants were individual contractors who had participated in a scheme designed to minimise its users’ income tax liability by splitting the remuneration for their work into two components: payment of a minimum wage via an offshore company and payment of sums through an employment benefit trust which purported to be discretionary loans. By the time of the hearing in this case the appellants accepted that all of the payments constituted taxable employment income.
They claimed however that they were entitled to deduct from their liability a credit for income tax that should (they argued) have been deducted under...