“I am currently the subject of a bankruptcy petition from HMRC for the sum of......However please note that the last statement received (27th November 2021 had the amount of£120,329.16 which clearly has taken into account previous correct statements sent in and payment made upon acceptance.”
“It is not too late for you to co-operate with our checks and provide the outstanding information and documents.”
“SS asked DM if he had taken any of the action warned in his last letter. DM said that he had issued assessments for tax years 09/10 to 12/13 inclusive this morning based on the figures shown in his last letter but that MW could appeal if he wished. SS said MW was now keen to sort things out. SS said MW agreed DM’s CGT figures for 09/10 and 10/11 and was ready to pay the tax for those 2 years…SS said that she had got bank statements from MW from 2012. She planned to analyse these together with statements from MW’s letting agent and prepare rental income and expenditure figures as best she could… DM said he was concerned with the absence of both income from property and self employment from some of MW’s returns and his means position for those years. SS said she completely understood DM’s concerns and she accepted that there was self employment (SE) as well as rental income. SS said she might pick up some SE in the analysis of the bank statements but that it would be more difficult to ascertain because of the absence of records. SS said MW had not kept records in the past and accepted DM’s comment that this would have to change now. SS proposed to prepare rental income figures 1st and then consider the likely SA income. DM said he would probably take a view of how realistic any overall income figures for rental income and SA were from a means point of view. DM said that it was important that SS saw all of MW’s bank accounts, including savings accounts, in preparing her figures. SS agreed and said she had told MW this and had done a credit check to be sure. She was confident that she had or would have statements for all accounts. SS assured DM of MW’s desire to sort things out now. She said she thought MW had been avoiding the issue in the past but now wanted to face up to it. …SS said that she and MW accepted that MW had to have income to live on and the reason for the nil returns in the past was that her firm had put in returns with no figures because MW had not provided them with the information that they needed to prepare the returns. SS said that part of the problem in preparing accurate figures was that MW could genuinely not remember details of what he had been doing in the past and had not kept business records. SS said she expected to have at least one set of figures ready for DM by next Friday 16 March and everything analysed within 30 days. SS said she would keep DM informed. DM said again that, if MW wanted to appeal against the assessments that DM had made today, then he needed to do so within 30 days.”
“She [Ms Sri] was concerned and wants to resolve matters. She mentioned that their client received a letter dated25 October 2018 from Justin Younger in Debt Management…in which he threatened to apply for a bankruptcy order.”
“I would expect that late appeals re the decisions in September and October would likely be considered, but that reopening older decisions would be dependent on the circumstances. Suji said she planned to work on this tonight and would email appeals to you tonight or tomorrow. She has my name and number so she may reference me when she emails you. I would note that Suji was a little flustered and a little confused about the appeals process. Also, she mentioned that the client is having health issues: epilepsy and something else.”
“As we spoke about I feel that you are doing the correct thing in negotiating with HMRC and the salient inspector. As I stated there are important points here: 1. To get the bankruptcy petition removed by HMRC 2. To get the overall amount reduced 3. To show good faith 4 . In line with 3. above to make a payment on account to demonstrably show this. It is equally important that you emphasise that there was never an intention not to not pay HMRC. Again as stated you need to obtain HMRC's exact position on the disposal of the property and payment to then with funds fromthereof.”
“(1) On an application for relief from any sanction imposed for a failure to comply with any rule, practice direction or court order, the court will consider all the circumstances of the case, so as to enable it to deal justly with the application, including the need – (a) for litigation to be conducted efficiently and at proportionate cost; and (b) to enforce compliance with rules, practice directions and orders.”
“The clear message emerging from the cases – particularised in Denton and similar cases and implicitly endorsed in BPP – is that in exercising judicial discretions generally, particular importance is to be given to the need for ‘litigation to be conducted efficiently and at proportionate cost’, and ‘to enforce compliance with rules, practice directions and orders’. We see no reason why the principles embodied in this message should not apply to applications to admit late appeals just as much as to applications for relief from sanctions, though of course this does not detract from the general injunction which continues to appear inCPR rule 3.9 to ‘consider all the circumstances of the case’.”
“the FTT can have regard to any obvious strength or weakness of the applicant’s case; this goes to the question of prejudice – there is obviously much greater prejudice for an applicant to lose the opportunity of putting forward a really strong case than a very weak one. It is important however that this should not descend into a detailed analysis of the underlying merits of the appeal…It is clear that if an applicant’s appeal is hopeless in any event, then it would not be in the interests of justice for permission to be granted so that the FTT’s time is then wasted on an appeal which is doomed to fail. However, that is rarely the case. More often, the appeal will have some merit. Where that is the case, it is important that the FTT at least considers in outline the arguments which the applicant wishes to put forward and the respondents’ reply to them. This is not so that it can carry out a detailed evaluation of the case, but so that it can form a general impression of its strength or weakness to weigh in the balance. To that limited extent, an applicant should be afforded the opportunity to persuade the FTT that the merits of the appeal are on the face of it overwhelmingly in his/her favour and the respondents the corresponding opportunity to point out the weakness of the applicant’s case. In considering this point, the FTT should be very wary of taking into account evidence which is in dispute and should not do so unless there are exceptional circumstances.”
“We accept HMRC’s general point that, in most cases, when the FTT is considering an application for permission to make a late appeal, failings by a litigant’s advisers should be regarded as failings of the litigant.”
“It is precisely because of the importance of complying with statutory time limits that, when considering applications for permission to make a late appeal, failures by a litigant’s adviser should generally be treated as failures by the litigant.”
“Ordinarily this court should not distinguish between the litigant himself and his advisers. There are good reasons why the court should not: firstly, if anyone is to suffer for the failure of the solicitor it is better that it be the client than another party to the litigation; secondly, the disgruntled client may in appropriate cases have his remedies in damages or in respect of the wasted costs; thirdly, it seems to me that it would become a charter for the incompetent...”
“…to start with the general rule that the failure of Mr Bridger [Mr Katib’s adviser] to advise Mr Katib of the deadlines for making appeals, or to submit timely appeals on Mr Katib’s behalf, is unlikely to amount to a ‘good reason’ for missing those deadlines when considering the second stage of the evaluation required by Martland.”
“It is clear from the [FTT] decision that Mr Bridger did not provide competent advice to Mr Katib, misled him as to what steps were being taken, and needed to be taken, to appeal against the PLNs [personal liability notices] and failed to appeal against the PLNs on Mr Katib’s behalf. But…the core of Mr Katib’s complaint is that Mr Bridger was incompetent, did not give proper advice, failed to appeal on time and told Mr Katib that matters were in hand when they were not. In other words, he did not do his job. That core complaint is, unfortunately, not as uncommon as it should be. It may be that the nature of the incompetence is rather more striking, if not spectacular, than one normally sees, but that makes no difference in these circumstances. It cannot be the case that a greater degree of adviser incompetence improves one’s chances of an appeal, either by enabling the client to distance himself from the activity or otherwise.”
“ I am the sole carer for my elderly mother (who is now 94). My mother is in poor health (at the time of writing she has been admitted to hospital). As you can imagine the strains and pressure of dealing with all has been a heavy responsibility and one which has added to all the above.”
“…when considering the third stage of the evaluation required by Martland, we should recognise that exceptions to the general rule are possible and that, if Mr Katib was misled by his advisers, that is a relevant consideration.”
“…that does not weigh greatly in the balance since most people who instruct a representative to deal with litigation do so because of their own lack of expertise in this arena. We do not consider that, given the particular importance of respecting statutory time limits, Mr Katib’s complaints against Mr Bridger or his own lack of experience in tax matters are sufficient to displace the general rule that Mr Katib should bear the consequences of Mr Bridger’s failings...”