HMRC has added ‘Spotlight 41’ to its targeted list of tax avoidance schemes, concerning the Supreme Court decision in RFC 2012 plc (in liquidation) (formerly Rangers Football Club plc) v Advocate General for Scotland [2017] STC 1556, involving employee benefit trusts. In particular, HMRC says it will regard the principle set out in the decision, that employment income paid from an employer to a third party is generally taxable as employment income on the employee, as applicable to a wide range of disguised remuneration schemes. This will include:
employee benefit trusts, including variants within these schemes where no loans are made from the EBT but instead the funds remain in, or are invested by, the trust;
disguised remuneration routed through employer-funded retirement benefit trusts; and
HMRC has added ‘Spotlight 41’ to its targeted list of tax avoidance schemes, concerning the Supreme Court decision in RFC 2012 plc (in liquidation) (formerly Rangers Football Club plc) v Advocate General for Scotland [2017] STC 1556, involving employee benefit trusts. In particular, HMRC says it will regard the principle set out in the decision, that employment income paid from an employer to a third party is generally taxable as employment income on the employee, as applicable to a wide range of disguised remuneration schemes. This will include:
employee benefit trusts, including variants within these schemes where no loans are made from the EBT but instead the funds remain in, or are invested by, the trust;
disguised remuneration routed through employer-funded retirement benefit trusts; and
