£10bn in UK stamp duty ‘may have been overpaid’

PEOPLE with their own pensions who purchased commercial property as part of the pot may have paid stamp duty or land and buildings tax unnecessarily, it is claimed.

David Mcghie, a director at accountants and advisers Acumen, says the intricacies of the Finance Act 2003 have led to a general belief that land and buildings tax and stamp duty is payable on the purchase of all commercial property.

However, it is claimed there is no requirement to tax property transferred from a pension partnership to a connected pension trust scheme.

In one example, the taxman found in favour of a client who held a property jointly with his wife and who rented the property to their familycontrolled company.

The rented property was transferred to a connected pension scheme at market value of £580,000.

Mr Mcghie said all parties were connected to each other for the purposes of the stamp duty land tax/land and building transaction tax provisions relating to partnerships, and since the property was being transferred from a partnership to a connected pension trust scheme, there was no chargeable consideration.

The £18,500 tax paid was ruled to have been in error and the client received a refund of the tax in full plus interest. Mr Mcghie says he believes the case is the tip of the iceberg and it comes as a push is launched to recover money for clients on a no-win, no-fee basis.

Several legal organisations are involved in the campaign which it is claimed could represent more than £10 billion of recoupable payments across the UK.

Owners of dental and medical practices, and footballers, are examples of the type of people who use such pensions. It involves SIPPS, selfinvested personal pensions which allow individuals to make their own investment decisions, and SSASS,