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Dan Neidle Profile picture
@DanNeidle
Sep 14 • 11 tweets • 3 min read • Read on X
What happens when you pay a fortune for tax advice from someone, and the advice turns out to be incompetent? And HMRC demands the tax back plus penalties?

If you guessed "you get all your money back" then I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. Image
Dodgy R&D tax firm ZLX made large research and development tax credit claims for its clients, charging a 30% fee. Often these claims had no legitimate basis
I'm aware of one case where ZLX advised a small firm to make £200k in claims, for which they paid ZLX £60k fees.

They're now being pursued by HMRC for the £200k plus £100k penalties. And they're £60k out of pocket. They believe ZLX was extraordinarily negligent...
But if they want to recover their £160k loss they have to deal with this astonishing exclusion clause in ZLX's standard terms. It purports to limit liability to £1,000

And ZLX had no insurance. The clients get nothing. Image
Got to wonder if that's enforceable, e.g. under UCTA (although note the contract was governed by Scottish law, where I have zero expertise). Image
If the clients could prove fraud then the exclusion would fall away and they could pursue ZLX's directors personally.

But that's really hard, and in the end they will have the plausible defence of just being incompetent and unqualified (which is what they were).
The hard lesson: never instruct any tax or legal professional who isn't properly insured. And certainly never accept a limitation of liability that leaves you totally unprotected.
More about ZLX in this episode of Radio 4's Untaxing:

Available now on BBC Sounds (unless you're outside the UK, in which case it isn't)bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00…
And much, much more detail about ZLX here: taxpolicy.org.uk/2025/04/06/unt…
And ZLX's extremely weird R&D claim for Dundee United FC here: taxpolicy.org.uk/2025/07/31/dun…
And the brilliant reporting by the Times: thetimes.com/sport/football…

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More from @DanNeidle

Dan Neidle Profile picture
Sep 9
Every second a Labour MP spends campaigning for a wealth tax is a second that could be spent campaigning for real tax reform that could make the tax system fairer, boost economic growth and (unlike the wealth tax) actually happen.

A thread: Image
There will never be a wealth tax in the UK. Anyone who's looked at the evidence knows it would take years to implement, would hit investment, damage growth and kill jobs.

The evidence: taxpolicy.org.uk/2025/07/22/uk-…Evidence shows the wealth tax would hit long-run GDP by 2% to 5%, would produce no revenues before 2029, and those revenues would be much less than proponents claim.
There's lots of tax reform that MPs should be pushing for, that would make our tax system fairer *and* boost growth.

But hardly any Labour MPs are talking about tax reform, thanks to the obsession with the wealth tax.
Read 13 tweets
Dan Neidle Profile picture
Sep 4
Last Tuesday, I awoke to an email from the High Court, rejecting an attempt to silence me with an interim injunction

This came as a surprise, because I'd no idea anyone had applied for an injunction. Even though this was an "on notice" injunction application

A quick WTF 🧵 Image
Longer version of this thread, with copies of the injunction application and the court's response.

(Spoiler: it wasn't a very favourable response)

taxpolicy.org.uk/2025/09/04/set…
What kind of lawyer would apply for an "on notice" injunction without giving notice?

The answer: the "leading tax barrister in the country"

At least that's what tax barrister Setu Kamal wanted me to describe him as. Or he'd sue me. Image
Read 19 tweets
Dan Neidle Profile picture
Sep 4
The Telegraph says Ms Rayner sought advice from "a conveyancer and two experts in trust law".

So how could they all get the law wrong? A 🧵
with some speculation.

(Pure speculation, but based on my experience of how clients and advisers behave.) Image
Some possible scenarios:
1. the Telegraph is wrong (or was wrongly briefed), and Ms Rayner either didn't approach the right lawyers, or didn't disclose the trust to them.

If that's what happened, then fair to blame Ms Rayner. She was careless (in my view).
Read 22 tweets
Dan Neidle Profile picture
Sep 3
It's very unusual for someone to pay the wrong amount of stamp duty when they're receiving tax advice.

There are probably three possibilities:

(1) Ms Rayner got the law wrong
(2) She didn't take the right advice
(3) She didn't disclose all the facts to the law firm. Image
If it's the law firm's fault, then hard to blame Ms Rayner.

If it's scenario 2 or 3, then completely fair to blame her

Given Ms Rayner's position, it's reasonable to expect full transparency as to what happened
It sounds like it's para 12 Sch 4ZA Finance 2003 that applied. A trust in favour of child can deem the parents as still owning the property.

Yes, the rules are complicated, but if you can't advise on complex stamp duty then you shouldn't be advising on stamp duty. Image
Read 4 tweets
Dan Neidle Profile picture
Sep 3
Every Monday am, we publish an updated list of every UK plc that's failed to file its accounts on time.

Sometimes a company is on the list because of Companies House delay/error.

Often, the companies are troubled, bust, or incompetent.

But sometimes it's just fraud: Image
Randomly clicking through the list, it's pretty obvious which are just innocent errors, incompetence, etc... and the frauds quickly stand out.

Meet Herran Finance plc. Image
Let's look at Herran Finance plc's last accounts.

Supposedly it's dormant. It had £59,892,205 cash in 2020 and exactly the same in 2021. It made no interest or other return. Had no expenses of any kind.

I don't think so. The accounts are fake. Image
Read 12 tweets
Dan Neidle Profile picture
Aug 24
How much tax do we pay in the UK, compared to other countries?

This much: Image
Or if we order it by income/payroll taxes instead: Image
The underlying data comes from the wonderful OECD data explorer. I've then made some subjective choices re categorisation (for example moving capital gains tax from an "income tax" to a "property/wealth" tax).

All details and code here: github.com/DanNeidle/oecd…
Read 5 tweets

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