The Worldwide Disclosure Facility (WDF) - Offshore Disclosure Case Study

At Forths, we have prepared and submitted many WDF cases to HMRC.

We were approached by a UK tax resident who had been encouraged to invest in India through family and friends. Specifically, he was under the impression that he and his wife would not be liable to UK tax on any investment interest and gains that he received from India. This was compounded by them completing Indian tax returns and paying Indian tax on some of their investments.

By chance this individual spoke with an existing client of Forths who also held overseas investments and they recommended that he spoke with our tax disclosure team. 

An initial no obligation telephone consultation was swiftly arranged. The advice provided following the conversation was for the client and his wife to inform HMRC of their intention to notify that they wish to make a disclosure under the terms of the WDF. 

Within a matter of days the client and his wife were accepted into the WDF and HMRC were happy to extend the terms of the WDF to them and provide them both with 90 days by which to make their full and complete disclosure. 

During this disclosure window, with guidance from Forths, the client was able to source all the papers that were required regarding their investment, including Indian tax returns and interest statements.

Working closely with our tax disclosure team the calculations of tax and behavioural penalties were discussed and the offer to HMRC finalised. The disclosure was then submitted within the permitted timescales and offer amount paid over to HMRC.

HMRC then reviewed the disclosure and asked for confirmation of the tax technical calculations that had been prepared. Having an in-depth knowledge of the case, our tax disclosure team dealt with all the correspondence and HMRC queries on the clients’ behalf. Satisfied, HMRC accepted the clients’ offshore disclosure. 

The whole process took a little under 4 months and enabled the clients to catch up with 5 years of underpaid tax in a controlled and managed manner, and more importantly, are now completely UK tax compliant and will remain so through retaining our tax compliance services.