Visits - by agreement or with advance notice - HM Revenue & Customs

Compliance checks series
Visits – by agreement or
with advance notice
Why we visit business premises
As part of a compliance check, we may ask to visit your business premises if you
have any. This is so that we can look at your records or business assets and find out
more about how your business operates. We only visit if we think it is necessary.
A visit can help us complete the check more quickly and effectively.
How we arrange a visit
Visits are normally carried out with your agreement. We will contact you by phone
or letter to arrange a date and time for the visit. We will usually give you at least
seven days notice. If you need to change the appointment, please let us know as
soon as possible.
If we have not been able to get your agreement to a visit, we may still need
to visit your business premises to carry out an inspection. If we do, we will give
you advance notice. We will also give you a notice of inspection. This is a legal
document that allows us to inspect your business premises, assets and statutory
records. Statutory records are the records that tax laws say a person must keep.
In some circumstances we may carry out an inspection without giving advance
notice or seeking agreement. You can find more information about this in factsheet
CC/FS4 Unannounced visits for inspections and CC/FS5 Unannounced visits for
inspections approved by the tribunal. Details of how you can get a copy of these
factsheets are shown in the right hand panel of this factsheet.
If you do not think we should visit, please tell us why. We will explain why we want
to visit you and why we think a visit is the best way to carry out our check. There may
be other options for us to get the information we need.
About the visit
You do not have to be present at the visit, but it will be helpful if you are. This will
allow us to ask you any questions we may have about your business and how it
operates, and discuss the outcome of the visit with you. This will help us complete
the check as quickly as possible and reduce any inconvenience that it may cause you.
If you cannot be there, someone else must be there to give us access to any assets
or records that we need to see. We will normally let you know in advance what
records or assets we need to see. If we have given you a notice of inspection,
this will give you details of what we need to inspect and when.
If you have an adviser we may contact them to tell them about our check. You can
ask your adviser to be there when we visit. If you prefer, we may be able to look at
your records in your adviser’s office or in our office. Please let us know if this is the
case. You can find information about appointing an adviser in the right hand panel
of this factsheet.
Customers with particular
needs
If there is anything about your health
or personal circumstances that may
make it difficult for you to deal with
this check, please tell the officer that
is carrying out the check. Telling them
will mean that they can help you in the
most appropriate way.
For example, if:
• English is not your first language
• you would like us to use a certain
format to communicate with you,
for example, Braille or Text Relay
• you would like us to visit you
at home because it is difficult for you
to get to one of our offices.
For more information go to
www.hmrc.gov.uk/contactus/
particular-needs.htm
If you need help or
more information
If you have any questions, please
contact the officer dealing with
the check. You can also look for the
information you need on our website.
Go to hmrc.gov.uk
Authorising a representative
You can authorise someone to deal
with us on your behalf. This includes
professional tax advisers, friends or
relatives. They can deal with us just
for a compliance check, or more
permanently for your day to day
tax affairs.
If you want to authorise a professional
tax adviser, they will be able to give
you a form to complete and send to
us. If you want to authorise someone
other than a professional tax adviser,
you will need to write to tell us who
you want to authorise and what you
want them to deal with for you.
CC/FS3 Page 1 HMRC 08/12

A visit to a small business may take a few hours, but if your business is large or
complex, or if the matters we are looking at are complex, it may take several days.
We do not usually need to talk to people who work for you about our check.
However, we may ask to speak to the people who keep your records up to date,
such as payroll and finance records. We may also need to speak to some of the
people who work for you if we are looking at their employment status. If you do
not want them to know about our visit, please let us know.
We may need to take some of your records away to check in our own office. If we
do, we will explain why. We will give you a receipt for your records, keep them
secure and return them to you as soon as we can. If you need them back sooner,
we will make copies in our office and give these to you.
If you have any business assets that are kept somewhere other than the premises
we are visiting (for example, if you have more than one premises), we may need to
arrange a further visit to see them.
What if you run your business from home
We will normally only ever ask to visit you at home if you run your business from
there. We may however need to value your private premises to check your Income
Tax or Corporation Tax liability. We may also need to value property in your private
premises to check your liability to Stamp Duty Land Tax, Stamp Duty Reserve Tax or
Inheritance Tax, or to check any liabilities that relate to Capital Gains Tax.
Please tell us in advance if your business premises are also your home, or if you
keep any stock or other assets at home. The visiting officer will only be able to
enter those parts of your home which are used for business purposes unless you
invite them in or we are carrying out a valuation. If we visit you at your home
without knowing in advance that it is your home, we will only come in if you give
your permission. If you do, we will ask for your signature to confirm this.
What if we have given you a notice of inspection
and you fail to comply with it
If we give you a notice of inspection and you do not allow us to carry out the
inspection, we may ask an independent tribunal to approve an inspection. If they
approve an inspection and you still do not allow us to carry it out, we will charge
you a £300 penalty. You might also have to pay further penalties of up to £60
a day until you allow us to carry out the inspection.
If you have a reasonable excuse for not allowing us to carry out an inspection that
has been approved by the tribunal, we will not charge you a penalty. Please tell us
straightaway if you think you have a reasonable excuse.
A reasonable excuse is normally an unexpected or unusual event that is either
unforeseeable or beyond your control. What is or is not a reasonable excuse
depends on an individual’s abilities and circumstances. Those abilities and
circumstances may mean that what is a reasonable excuse for one person may not
be a reasonable excuse for someone else. If you think you have a reasonable excuse
please tell us. If we accept that you have a reasonable excuse, we will not charge
a penalty.
What if you are unhappy with
our service
If you are unhappy with our service,
please tell the person or office you
have been dealing with. They will
try to put things right. If you are still
unhappy, they will tell you how
to complain.
There is more information on our
website. Go to www.hmrc.gov.uk/
complaints-appeals/how-to-complain/
make-complaint.htm
This factsheet relates to
checks into:
• Aggregates Levy
• Bank payroll tax
• Capital Gains Tax
• Climate Change Levy
• Construction Industry Scheme
• Corporation Tax
• Income Tax
• Inheritance Tax
• Insurance Premium Tax
• Landfill Tax
• National Insurance Classes 1, 1A
and 4
• Pay As You Earn (PAYE)
• Petroleum Revenue Tax
• Stamp Duty Land Tax
• Stamp Duty Reserve Tax
• VAT
This factsheet is one in
a series
For the full list of factsheets in our
Compliance checks series, go to
www.hmrc.gov.uk/compliance/
factsheets.htm
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Your principal rights and obligations
• You have the right to be represented. You can appoint anyone to act on your
behalf. This includes professional advisers, friends, and so on.
• You have the right to consult your adviser. We will allow a reasonable amount of
time for you to do so.
• We will protect information we obtain, receive or hold about you.
• We can only ask you for what is reasonable for us to carry out our check. What is
reasonable will depend on the circumstances of the check.
• You have the right to complain if you believe that we have not treated you fairly.
• You have an obligation to take care to get things right.
• If you have an adviser, you must still take reasonable care to make sure that
any returns, documents or details they send us on your behalf are correct.
Your Charter explains what you can expect from us and what we expect from you
For more information go to www.hmrc.gov.uk/charter
The Human Rights Act and your privacy
Article 8 of the Human Rights Act gives you the right to respect for your private
and family life, your home and your correspondence. We have the right to carry out
an inspection in a reasonable and proportionate way even when it conflicts with
your rights. If you think our inspection is not reasonable and proportionate,
tell us why.
We have a range of services
for people with disabilities,
including guidance in
Braille, audio and large
print. Most of our forms are
also available in large print.
Please contact us on any
of our phone helplines if
you need these services.
These notes are for guidance only and
reflect the position at the time of writing.
They do not affect any right of appeal.
HMRC Digital Service
August 2012 © Crown copyright 2012
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