The UK tax office is taking a tougher approach to clawing back debts, insolvency specialists said, in a bid to squeeze £5 billion (S$8.5 billion) in extra revenue that is adding to pressure on firms going out of business.
The move by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) to recoup owed taxes from collapsing businesses – including more use of debt collectors, less leeway on payment arrangements and moving the tax office up the hierarchy of creditors – has made corporate rescues more difficult and had a chilling effect on the availability of credit to save firms, according to people in the industry.
It comes amid a prolonged period of stretched public finances, exacerbated by the pandemic, Russia’s war in Ukraine and the double-digit inflation that followed. Successive UK chancellors have targeted what they call the gap between tax that is theoretically owed to the government and what is collected.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves is under pressure to fund improvements in public services and stabilise public finances when she delivers the new Labour government’s first budget on Oct 30. Her Conservative predecessor, Jeremy Hunt, boosted HMRC’s funding for debt collection in 2023 as part of a plan to raise an extra £5 billion over five years, including over £500 million this fiscal year.
But while insolvencies were kept low by state support during the Covid-19 pandemic, they have surged back, last year jumping to the highest in 30 years in England and Wales. So far in 2024, they are running at a similar pace to last year with the construction, hospitality and retail sectors particularly hard hit.
Corporate recovery specialist Begbies Traynor said last Friday (Oct 18) that the number of UK businesses in “significant financial distress” is up by a third compared to a year ago, blaming the legacy of high inflation and debt built up in the pandemic.
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“They’re sending in external debt collectors now much more quickly,” said Julie Palmer, regional managing partner at Begbies Traynor, adding that flexible arrangements known as time to pay are less available than at any time since the financial crisis. “Generally we just see them more active and quicker off the starting track in terms of chasing those liabilities down.”
Another person familiar with the matter echoed Traynor’s view on payment arrangements. Lee Manning, a partner at ReSolve, said HMRC are “making increasing use of third party debt collectors”, though he also said they are still “open to agreeing sensible and proportionate time to pay arrangements”.
Asked to comment, a spokesperson said the HMRC hasn’t changed its approach towards firms in debt, and that help such as instalment plans is still available for firms who engage with the tax collector.
Much of the scrutiny around the surge of insolvencies is on a change announced by former chancellor Philip Hammond in 2018, which saw HMRC leapfrog others to become a secondary creditor in the pecking order of who gets paid when a company goes under.
HMRC was considered an unsecured creditor for all of its debts, putting it below secured and preferential creditors if a company went under. This was in place from 2003 and in part intended to aid business rescues.
Hammond’s changes bumped HMRC ahead of secured creditors with a floating charge, such as lending secured against a company’s inventory. However, this is only in relation to certain tax debts, such as value added tax and employee national insurance contributions. For corporation tax debts and employer national insurance contributions, it still ranks as an unsecured creditor.
It took effect when former Tory premier Rishi Sunak ran the Treasury in 2020, but insolvency specialists say the impact really filtered through more recently with firms under pressure from a sluggish economy and high borrowing costs.
The changes may deter lending, according to insolvency advisers, as some creditors may be unable to claw back money if a company collapses. Rescues known as company voluntary arrangements (CVAs) – in which firms agree with creditors over a fixed period – are also more difficult, they said.
“It’s made a number of CVAs unviable,” said Manning. An alternative, known as a restructuring plan, “is much more convoluted, much more expensive, and it’s only really designed for larger companies”, he added.
The change effectively gives HMRC more control over whether company voluntary arrangements go ahead, according to Tom Russell, vice-president at R3, the trade body for insolvency experts.
“They rightly look after their own interest and the taxpayer interest,” he said. “It may give lenders pause for thought in terms of lending. But at a stage where a business is close to collapse, that is difficult to achieve anyway.” BLOOMBERG
