MSC audit scheme 'close' to fruition
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Her Majesty's Revenue & Customs (HMRC) is close to making a decision on an audit scheme for managed service providers, Recruiter can exclusively reveal.
In a statement HMRC said: "We are exploring the possibility of publishing an audit standard whereby certain external bodies applying the standard would be able to determine whether a scheme provider's business model would or would not result in client companies being managed service companies (MSCs)."
A spokesman added that a decision would be made "in the near future".
The prospect of such a scheme has received a mixed reaction. John Chaplin, director KPMG People Services Practice, said that it was good news. "There will be a fairly rapid sorting of the wheat from the chaff — between those who are trying to do their best to comply with the legislation, and those who are abusing the legislation for their own benefit.
"There's a widespread understanding and acceptance that agencies need some sort of clarity because the debt transfer provisions of the legislation come in in January," Chaplin continued. Chaplin said the difficulty was that there wasn't lot of time to get the scheme up and running by then. "KPMG would be one of the firms carrying out the audits," he added.
Adrian Marlowe, managing director of commercial and legal consultancy Lawspeed, told Recruiter: "Any scheme that is not fully accredited by HMRC will merely lead agencies into the trap of believing that they are dealing with compliant organisations. That's the danger of it."
Anne Fairweather, head of public policy at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), said that while she welcomed any scheme that made it clearer who was and was not an MSC, no scheme was 100% guaranteed. "The REC will be providing advice to members on how agencies could protect themselves within the next few weeks," Fair
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