It had been the practice that a Nil payment for the first instalment of preliminary corporation tax was acceptable for companies in their first year of trading, on a concessional basis. This year of course there is no “first instalment” as we are now out of the transitional period of the preliminary CT regime. ICAI has written to Revenue asking that the practice which applied for the first instalment for start-ups would apply generally going forward. The outcome will be published in tax.point, but for now, it should not be assumed that this will be the case.

More generally, ICAI has been lobbying throughout the year so that companies would be allowed base their preliminary CT on the previous year's result. It is hoped that there will be some development at the Budget or Finance Bill.