Readers are advised of developments in a number of areas:

• HMRC has issued Revenue & Customs Brief 47 (2014) to announce that the threshold for the requirement to submit Intrastat returns for arrivals increased from £1.2m to £1.5m per annum with effect from 1 January 2015. The threshold for dispatches remains unchanged at £250,000 per annum.
• Details of the Large Business Customer Relationship Management model have been published together with an outline of the role of the Customer Relationship Manager.
• An updated Double Taxation Treaty Passport Scheme register has been published.
• HMRC have published a briefing setting out how the Department tackles those who don’t register all their business activity and work within what is referred to as the ‘hidden economy’. In addition. ‘Our Approach to Compliance’ has also been published.
• HMRC was proposing to start some “test and learn” activity last month involving 750 businesses in the west London area. The activity is to explore how VAT desk based interventions could be carried out by obtaining taxpayer records up front (electronically where possible) instead of being made available on the day of a visit and how effective this approach is in comparison to existing business as usual face to face visits. This will be done by telephone by the assurance officer involved. A telephone interview may also be needed which would be a change to current practice in the majority of cases.
• HMRC have published guidance to help identify phishing and bogus emails.
• A tax information and impact note has announced that secondary legislation will be brought into operation which, from 6 March 2015, will amend the PAYE regulations to remove the requirement for employers to complete the End of Year checklist when making their final Full Payment Submission (FPS) for the tax year from 2014-15. The end of year checklist is a box on the FPS that, when ticked, opens the end of year declaration, consisting of seven questions. This was a feature of the now defunct P35, which had been incorporated into the design of the FPS under Real Time Information.
• A tax information and impact note has been published which announces that from 29 January 2015 the PAYE Regulations 2003 will be amended to allow for changes in the requirements concerning the issue of notices of Tax Coding to individuals. In particular, they amend the definition of “notice” within regulation 2 to allow for notices to be issued electronically to employees, and amend regulations 17 and 19 to remove the obligation to give the employee notice of a new Code notified to an employer where the employee is not liable to tax on their PAYE income, or their PAYE income is not chargeable
• The latest HMRC Pension newsletter covers a number of matters.
• At the end of 2014 the latest Trusts and Estates Newsletter was published. Topics covered include the transition of the web content to the GOV.UK website and Autumn Statement announcements including the simplification of trust charges and new rules for multiple trusts.
• Employer Bulletin issue 51 was published last month and contains plenty of information which may be of interest to employers and their agents.
• HMRC are providing a new Self-Assessment online chat service to taxpayers with Self- Assessment queries. The service runs in an open chat forum with “expert” staff on hand to answer questions. However, staff will not have access to the individual taxpayer’s account. This was available until the end of January 2015.
• A consultation seeking views on proposals to further simplify the automatic enrolment process for pensions and reduce burdens on employers has been opened.
• HMRC published CT600 Budget Insert (2014) which provides for an overview of the main Budget 2014 changes affecting Corporation Tax.
• Schema and supporting documents for Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) software developers has been published.
• VAT information sheet 10/14 which deals with the special scheme for non-EU businesses has been published, this covers some of the most used currency exchange rates (for period ending December 2014) needed by such businesses.
• HMRC have published draft guidance on two new reliefs for companies in financial distress which are included in the draft Finance Bill. These include a schedule of amendments to the corporation tax rules on loan relationships in Part 5 of the Corporation Tax Act 2009 (CTA 2009). New sections 322(5B) and 323A of CTA 2009 will remove the obligation to bring into account a loan relationships credit arising on a release, modification or replacement of debt in certain circumstances where a company is unable to pay its debts. The new sections will apply to the release, modification or replacement of a debtor relationship of a company on or after 1 January 2015.
• Draft regulations have been published to amend the Companies Act 2006 to stop companies from reducing their share capital as part of a scheme of arrangement for takeovers or mergers under which all the shares in the company are to be acquired, except where the acquisition amounts to a restructuring that inserts a new holding company into the group structure. Regulation 2 of same makes transitional provision to ensure that the prohibition does not affect takeovers where an announcement concerning a firm intention to make an offer has been made before the Regulations come into force, or the terms of the offer have been agreed in the case of a company that is not subject to the rules.