Fraudulent Emails from HMRC

Taxpayers are reminded that the problem of fraudulent emails continues. The emails are part of a 'phishing' exercise that uses bogus e-mails and websites to trick taxpayers into supplying confidential or personal information. These emails aren’t genuine HMRC messages and should be disregarded.

The phishing emails are being sent from inside the UK and around the world. The emails often start with phrases which alert taxpayers to a refund of tax with the emails containing links to fraudulent websites.

Any email that appears to be fraudulent should not be opened before verifying the authenticity of the email.
In a recent statement HMRC’s Director General of Benefits and Credits, said:

'HMRC will never ask you to disclose personal or payment information by email. We are committed to your online security but the methods fraudsters use to obtain information are constantly changing, so you need to be alert. Anyone who receives this type of email should send it to phishing@hmrc.gsi.gov.uk'

Auto enrolment - failing to plan is planning to fail

This legislative change means every employer is obliged to automatically enrol workers into a workplace pension scheme if they are aged between 22 and state pension age, earning more than £9,440 a year, and working in the UK.

The aim is to ensure that people start contributions at an early stage in their working lives,
changing the mind-set of the way the people of Britain save.

Now we are just at year one, and a lot of businesses have a long road ahead to ensure they comply before the legislative changes apply to them.

A recent survey in September 2013 showed that 60% of firms did not have a workplace pension scheme in place.

Of the 38% that do have a pension scheme, 15% said their scheme was not compliant with automatic enrolment legislation.

It is imperative that businesses’ understand the need to build in increasingly larger amounts of contributions
for their employees into financial forecasts as well as communicating the legislation effectively to employees.

Preparation is key to the success of the scheme, and businesses need to seek the support they need before
they are due to stage enrolment.

Our focus is on making the introduction of this complex legislation as simple as possible for businesses
of all sizes please call us for a no obligation review.