Crystal Umbrella

McGinley Recruitment Services is preparing to open a new office that will be based within their south east region. The new office will be located in West Horndon where there is a large grouping of customers for the railway industry. McGinley is one of the top suppliers of employment services across the UK. The company provides solutions for industries such as construction, railway, and aerospace.

The opening of this office falls in line with McGinley’s plans to expand. The West Horndon office will also help to better establish the company’s existence in the south east region. This office will work in conjunction with McGinley’s main office which is located in Watford.

When the new West Horndon branch is opened, the company intends to provide the railway industry with a number of comprehensive employment solutions. The managing director of McGinley, Chris Mariner, said that the opening of their newest branch shows a commitment to support clients that are in less accessible areas. This will allow McGinley Recruitment Services the ability to respond promptly to the needs of their clients as well.

Capita Group, which provides a variety of professional services, has announced that they have secured a number of substantial contracts this year. These contracts, worth approximately £767 million, were secured during the first quarter of 2009. Capita is one of the top outsourcers in the UK.

One of these contracts was secured with the Learning and Skills Council. The value of the contract is £68 million, spread over a four-year period. Capita also secured a contract with the Office for National Statistics. According to the terms of the contract, Capita will provide a number of temporary employees who will all be trained to work on the Census that is scheduled to occur in Wales and England in 2011.

According to Capita, the outsourcing market continues to remain solid despite the economic crisis. The company has said that its strategy of acquiring smaller business has proven to be quite effective. Capita added that they would continue to utilise this growth strategy throughout the rest of the year as well.

Capita has a number of bids that are still outstanding. They have estimated these bids to be worth more than £3 billion with each worth a minimum of £10 million.

Capita said “We remain confident that the areas across the group that are potentially affected by the current volatile economic climate represent less than 10% of our group revenues and this risk has been factored into our business plans for 2009.”

The Government’s proposal to publish the names of deliberate tax defaulters has met with concern from professional tax bodies, as the defamation of individuals by the HMRC could potentially harm the innocent if used inappropriately.

The proposition (BN63 in the Budget) entails the ‘naming and shaming’ of individuals who purposely avoid paying their taxes, and was part of a number of schemes outlined by the Chancellor in an effort to prevent tax evasion in the UK. The method has been used before, notably in Ireland, and is, on face value, morally difficult to oppose. However, The Chartered Institute of Taxation (CIOT) has warned that the proposition must be applied with caution and only in appropriate circumstances.

John Whiting, Chairman of the CIOT’s Management of Taxes Sub-Committee, stated: “A question for HMRC is what controls will there be over ensuring that someone who is affected by an HMRC mistake does not get into this sanction? And if HMRC do make a ‘naming’ mistake, would proper compensation be paid?”

The CIOT proposes several methods of ensuring that only the deserving parties are ultimately named and shamed, including instating a proper system of judgment which determines what offences would warrant a sanction; the limitation of the method to include only tax evaders who deliberately default and conceal; ensuring that HMRC will not use this power as a threat towards settling unrelated tax disputes; and the ability for the tax payer to appeal against publication.

Owners of small businesses, the self-employed and contractors are urged to take caution when handling their e-mails, as they are currently the prime target of a deceptive scam which has been escalating significantly over the last few weeks.

Targeted victims of the scam receive an e-mail disguised as an official letter from HMRC, which offers the recipient a tax refund of sorts, to be paid into their bank account. The victim, if deceived, is encouraged to provide personal information like bank details, which can be exploited by the perpetrators. This method of conning individuals out of personal information by masquerading as a respectable and trustworthy entity is known as ‘phishing’.

Fraud experts at Equifax rate phishing as a serious problem, and urge anyone who submits annual tax return forms to take caution.

Neil Munroe, External Affairs Director at Equifax, told Bytestart: “Fraudsters seem to be targeting tax payers around key deadlines and they are using the very enticing promise of tax refunds! Many of these emails can look very convincing for people who don’t know what to look for. But the crucial thing to remember is that HMRC would always notify individuals of tax refunds by post, rather than email or telephone.“

Employing good common sense and a modicum of caution will greatly help reduce the risks of being scammed. Those who suspect they are being targeted should delete the e-mail immediately, and never give out any personal information. Always ensure that you liaise with your Accountancy firm or Umbrella Company if you are unsure on what tax refund, if any, you should be expecting.

Source: http://www.bytestart.co.uk/content/news/1_12/hmrc-phishing-scam.shtml

Even in the midst of recession-related struggle a majority of interim managers maintain an optimistic attitude toward their jobs, remaining confident that their flexibility, expertise and result-driven focus will eventually earn them more work, a recent survey shows.

Russam GMS, an interim management provider, asked 10,000 interims in their second ‘Recession and the Interim Manager” survey how they felt about their position in the current economic situation and what their future prospects were in regards to their jobs. 61% of those asked stated that they were confident of their eventual success in spite of the recession, as many businesses eager to get quickly back on track are believed to be planning to opt for interim management in the future.

Financial struggle however is currently a major issue for many interims. According to the survey, half of the respondents said they had suffered with being given fewer assignments, with 19% claiming that it takes clients longer to make decisions. 11% considered the current market overflowing with people without previous interim experience, most of whom have been recently made redundant.

GMS urged interims to ensure that they are adequately trained and prepared for the abundant problems in the market today.

Charles Russam, chairman of Russam GMS, told Recruiter: “Training and development is important. The IMA [Interim Management Association] Institute provides excellent interim training programmes and at Russam we have many professional development activities for our interims. The most important thing for interims is to think of themselves as a serious small business, not as an individual.”

A recent article, by Times Online, identifies several ways for high-earners to survive in the current climate caused by the new tax regulations as outlined in the Budget. It further recommends Umbrella Companies as a particularly good option for consultants, as they can allow workers to offset travel and other expenses against tax.

Setting up your own limited company is another viable way to reduce your tax expenses, with the company tax at a significantly lower rate than the top tax, it is believed many high-earning contractors, freelancers, consultants and self-employed will be moving to limited company structures in an effort to reduce expenses and warehouse their profits. However, compared to Umbrella Companies this can result in higher costs in terms of administration, fees and time, when you can achieve the same savings by using a reputable audited Umbrella Company.

In addition to taxation at the corporate rate, benefits for contractors and freelancers creating personal-service companies include exemption from national insurance tax. Workers are however, required to prove that they are truly self-employed, which they can only do by consulting experts to understand their IR35 status; again Umbrella companies can achieve the same savings and unsure that you operate compliantly in terms of IR35 status.

Initial source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/tax/article6168188.ece?token=null&offset=36&page=4