Reviewing or correcting your tax returns - letter

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Maryb50

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Hi! Just wondered if anyone got this letter from Revenue? I'm very meticulous about tax returns and am not aware of any discrepancies on my tax returns. I declared all income from rents. Properties were registered. Receipts for all expenses. Do I reply to this letter and say I am not aware of any issues with my tax returns. The letter thanked me for submitting my 2015 return. I didn't submit a return in 2016 as I have no property rented. I am starting a small business sine Jan, but no income from it yet. It says that where any changes to tax returns are being made that relate to offshore matters - that these changes will restrict a person's ability to make a qualifying disclosure form 1st May. I don't have any offshsore accounts. Did everyone get these letters, or or some people selected. I recently moved house and changed tax district - has that something to do with it? What, if anything, should I do?
 
I got one and so did my father, I am self employed, my father is in his 80s and on a state pension only with an additional small deed of covenant income. Letters implied they were writing to all self assessed taxpayers or it may just be random but either way I just filed them away, nothing out of the way in my returns either or my fathers for that matter.
 
I haven't seen a copy of the letter (not yet anyway) but if it specifically mentions offshore matters then that is probably what they are focusing on.

Revenue are like a Spanish super-trawler when they send out those letters. They send out thousands of letters hoping that they will catch a few people. All it does it put the willies up loads of people who then contact their accountants etc wondering why they get these types of letters.

It's the same with Preliminary Tax letters, people who clearly have no obligation to pay Preliminary Tax still get letters from Revenue "reminding" them that they haven't paid anything. Cue phone call from tax payer to accountant wondering why their tax affairs aren't up-to-date.
 
I got the letter and I live abroad, it seems to be a general mailing to all tax payers.
 
This is my first time posting and I find the forum excellent after reading a number of posts, I found the forum by chance and see that there are many experts and would like to expose my situation and ask a single question. Note that I’m not seeking any free advise but would like to understand the implications of that below.

My wife is self-employed and received the well known letter discussed here last week.
She has no foreign account, properties or income but I have one and have not received any letters so far ?

Like probably one fifth of the population I work for a US multinational and received shares a number of times a few years ago. I normally would sell them immediately and transfer them to a personal U.S. account that I had opened many years ago while working in the U.S. in the late 1990s and still have now just to diversify and having some investment other than Euro.

The last time I received shares it was back in 2009 and were ”Revenue Approved” and were that type of shares that a the company would keep for 4 or 5 years and then once matured there was no tax to pay.
I sold them a few weeks after the company released them to me and transferred them into my personal US account and made a capital gain of under 1200 € so no tax would accrue. I still have the statement for those Revenue Approved shares.

Between 2007 and 2008 for two years I signed up to an ESSP scheme where you would invest a percentage of your wage in the company shares over a 6 months period and they would give you a discount of 15% on the shares.
I had paid the income tax between the difference of the price that I had received them and the market value. I also made a capital gain a few times and paid the tax. I still have the receipts sent to me by Revenue and also the receipts for the capital gain tax paid. That’s going back up to 2007

I also received some share back around 2003-2005 so we are talking about many years ago. I cannot remember now what type of shares they were if they were stock options restricted shares etc. I cannot remember paying any tax on them but I especially can’t tell now if there was any tax to pay on those and I didn’t or the tax was held by the company at source.

I rang BoI and they said that they cannot go back so far in time providing me with the statements, information clues etc. I asked my company which in the meantime went through a raft of mergers and acquisitions and they have no records going back so far either. My US bank told me that they can see some wires coming during these years 2003-2005 but cannot trace where they came from since so many years have elapsed. On the other hand two years ago I moved house and cleared a lot of old papers that were catching dust. I only kept the documentation going back 10 years. So I can go back only until 2007.

I also didn’t declare the US account since when I opened it I was living in the US. So I don’t know if I’m fully tax compliant going back before 2007 and have no way to find out.
I wonder if there are any chances that when Revenue sends me the letter they will ask me the documentation going back many many years like 2005 , 2006. Sorry for the length of the post

Thanks in advance for any feedback

Patrick L.
 
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Hi
I read a few things and it seems that in Ireland the revenue system can go back in theory forever I don’t know what it means forever but there is no statutory limitation, which is quite unfair, I wonder in reality if they do go back that long, over 10 years unless there was a proven serious tax fraud. In Germany where I’m from the tax authority is barred from going back more than 5 years unless they can prove serious tax fraud. If they do (and they have to prove it) then they can still go back 10 years maximum, no more. I worked in Italy and France before and they have more or less the same rules as far as I remember, I think in Italy it was 6 and 12 years maximum and there is a big difference if you have an account in Panama or Belize vs. in EU country or US for example. Instead for the Irish revenue system it is all the same. I think the system here is very geared in favor of the revenue with very little protection for the average person.
Here we have

1. The likes of the big US corporations that teamed up with the government and pay zero tax

2. A number of people on the dole with family income supplement , medical card and cash jobs on the side (I know a few)
3. The vast majority of decent honest self employed or Payee people that are catering for categories 1 and 2 above and like
in the case of Patrick are worried that despite the already draconian regime of taxation, Revenue can question him going back
maybe 15 years simply for having a U.S. account and worrying that his tax affairs were maybe not perfectly in order 15 years ago.
 
Patrick L

Revenue only go back 6 years except in the case of suspected fraud.

You were not required to inform Revenue that you opened an account in the US if you were living there at the time and not in Ireland.

If you have paid all the tax due, you have nothing to worry about.
 
This letter was issued, because of a recent change in the law

"the Finance Act 2016 restricts, from 1 May 2017, a taxpayer's ability to make a qualifying disclosure which relates directly or indirectly to an offshore matter in respect of which Irish tax is payable."

Revenue are just informing people of this.

If you have declared all your income and paid tax on it, its not really relevant to you.
 
@Patrick L are you jointly assessed with your wife the letter only issued to the person registered for income tax self assessment, who in joint assessment cases would be responsible for the tax liabilities of both spouses.
 
Drip feed campaign by Revenue tot he media in last few days. latest is a threat to go after about 9,000 people that are in receipt of UK pensions.
 
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