A recent Court of Appeal case (Bampton Property Group Ltd and others v King) concerned whether HMRC should accept late claims for group relief from Corporation Tax for a company who were members of a group of property companies.
The taxpayers originally submitted claims for group relief but made mistakes on the apportionment of relief available; they did not take into account the fact that overlapping accounting periods would qualify. They therefore submitted late claims for group relief to relieve the losses in other members of the group.
HMRC refused the claim as the deadline for making a claim had passed.
The taxpayers claimed they had made an innocent error, which the Revenue had known about but not drawn to their attention, however the Court of Appeal rejected the claims, stating that, the fact that HMRC had not told the taxpayers they had made an error did not have to be taken into account when determining whether to accept the late claim.
The enquiries opened actually extended the period the taxpayers had to realise their error. The taxpayers’ appeal was therefore dismissed.