Comments on: Tax professionals whould know better http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2006/06/28/tax-professionals-whould-know-better/ Richard Murphy on tax and corporate accountability Tue, 06 Jan 2009 10:42:52 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: Mark Lee http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2006/06/28/tax-professionals-whould-know-better/#comment-5 Mark Lee Fri, 07 Jul 2006 07:05:45 +0000 http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/?p=14#comment-5 Richard I too attempted to create such a scale last year. There is one other type of tax advice that does not fall easily within any of your categories. You have rightly included <i>"misrepresenting the nature of a transaction"</i> as <i>fraud</i> but that is not the whole story. Often advisers earn their fees by enabling clients to make an informed choice between two equally acceptable descriptions of a transaction so that HMRC are less likely to challenge a claim for relief, for example. There is sadly only a fine line between misrepresenting and choosing a less contentious description than might otherwise be adopted. This reinforces the view that all too often the gap between what is acceptable and what is unacceptable tax advice is very slim. Richard
I too attempted to create such a scale last year. There is one other type of tax advice that does not fall easily within any of your categories.

You have rightly included “misrepresenting the nature of a transaction” as fraud but that is not the whole story.

Often advisers earn their fees by enabling clients to make an informed choice between two equally acceptable descriptions of a transaction so that HMRC are less likely to challenge a claim for relief, for example. There is sadly only a fine line between misrepresenting and choosing a less contentious description than might otherwise be adopted.

This reinforces the view that all too often the gap between what is acceptable and what is unacceptable tax advice is very slim.

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