Get Ready For PAYE online filing 2006 and £250 again!

We are now just over a month away from the end of the PAYE year. Employers’ need to be prepared and ready.

Employers with more than 49 employees must file online and the incentive payment for other to file online this year is £250, the same as last year. However, since last year’s PAYE year end, HMRC is paying more attention to those employers who intend to abuse the incentive payment arrangements.

Employers who pay earnings solely to exploit the system may find their incentive payments blocked by anti-avoidance regulations introduced in March 2005 – in some cases too late to prevent abuses last year, but in plenty of time to stop the same problems this year end.

It is worth noting that following evidence of abuse of the system last year, HMRC announced in January that all the £250 incentive payments for last year were now being scrutinised in detail before any further payments are made. This will only affect those employers with a nil liability for both last year and this year. Employers in this position may now have to wait a further one to two months to receive their payments.