The Institute has been working with HMRC and the other Professional Bodies to drive readiness for the first tranche of mandation for Making Tax Digital (MTD) for income tax from April 2026. We are also aware of members concerns about this project and will continue to represent your views to HMRC. An Institute strategy is also being implemented to aid preparations which involves a range of resources, webinars and events including a HMRC led event in September which we will share more details of when available. As part of our joint Professional Body collaboration we are pleased to share details of a new initiative by the Association of Tax Technicians (ATT) who have confirmed that you don’t need to be an ATT member to participate. The first event takes place this week on Wednesday 21 May. More details of this new initiative are highlighted below. Join an MTD peer-discussion group. Sign up here. To help you prepare, this is a series of monthly online drop in sessions where you can speak to your peers about tips and practical advice on getting ready. Facilitated by the ATT’s technical team, these sessions aim to serve as an open forum for attendees to share and discuss their practical concerns around MTD and support each other. Topics driven by you could include (but are not limited to): The challenges of getting clients ready, Resourcing and workflow issues, The choice of software, and Pricing MTD services. These one hour sessions are taking place from 12–1pm on the following dates: Wed 21 May, Tue 17 June, Wed 23 July, Wed 20 August, Wed 17 September, and Tue 28 October.

HMRC is consulting on potential reforms to its behavioural penalty regime. The consultation is open until 18 June 2025 and seeks views on options to ‘simplify and strengthen’ the behavioural penalty regime for inaccuracies and failures to notify. The Institute will be responding to the consultation and is seeking your views on the proposals. HMRC has been holding workshops on the proposed changes and have provided a useful document summarising the proposals an overview of which is provided below. Contact us by email by Friday 6 June to share your feedback. For failure to notify penalties, HMRC is proposing to remove the timing of disclosure as a factor in determining the relevant penalty ranges and is also proposing to remove the narrower penalty ranges. There are also proposals to combine consideration of the type and quality of disclosure into one step, so that there is one set of headline rates. ‘Telling’ and ‘helping’ would be combined into one category to reduce overlap. For deliberate and repeated non-compliance, the potential changes are: increased penalty rates for all deliberate behaviour (e.g. same level as category 2 offshore penalties), a new higher tier of penalty rates for repeated deliberate non-compliance (e.g. at the same level as Category 3 offshore penalties) and the potential for higher rates to be 'reset' for new occurrences in the future, the merger of ‘deliberate but not concealed’ and ‘deliberate and concealed’ into a single ‘deliberate’ category, and to codify ‘deliberate’ in penalty legislation, e.g. regarding intent, blind-eye knowledge, and, potentially, recklessness. There are also proposals for offshore penalties and penalty suspension. Alternative approaches are also considered as are a range of potential new non-financial penalties, many of which are very concerning.

The European Commission's Directorate-General for Taxation and Customs Union has published an exploratory study on health taxes from an EU perspective. The study provides an in-depth analysis of the current state of taxes on products high in fat, sugar and salt in the European Union, including their design, implementation, and impact on public health.

The European Parliament’s FISC Subcommittee hosted a public hearing on the implementation of the Two-Pillar framework in the light of the US Administration backing down from some of the tax commitments it has made previously. The hearing assessed the implications for the EU's approach to global tax governance and analysed the next steps for the implementation of the OECD agreement for a global minimum tax rate for multinational companies.

EU finance ministers have agreed a new approach to the Value Added Tax (VAT) rules for distance sales of imported goods and import VAT. The new directive will make suppliers liable for the import VAT and VAT on certain distance sales. Foreign traders or platforms using the VAT Import One-stop Shop will not need to be registered in each Member State.

Revenue has updated its guidance on the income tax and PRSI treatment of individuals who are engaged as Sub-Postmasters by An Post, and Social Welfare Branch Managers by the Department of Social Protection. The updated guidance confirms that the five-step framework, as set out in the Supreme Court judgement in the Karshan (Midlands) Ltd t/a Domino’s Pizza case [2023] IESC 24, should be used to determine whether the individual is an employee or is self-employed.

Revenue has updated its general background guidance on corporation tax. The updated guidance reflects Finance Act 2024 amendments to Start-up Relief for companies under section 486C TCA 1997. The new participation exemption for foreign distributions under section 831B TCA 1997 in also included in the revised guidance.  

Revenue has updated its guidance on the High-Income Individual’s Restriction to reflect amendments to section 485C TCA1997 introduced by Finance Act 2024. The amendments delete section 485C (1B) TCA 1997 and relevant references in Schedule 25B of the Act which were required to reflect the removal of obsolete provisions in the section dealing with the restriction on the use of capital allowances for certain leased assets.  Examples throughout the guide have also been updated to the calendar year 2024, with the 2024 credit values and rate bands now applied.

The Minister for Finance, Paschal Donohoe has recently signed the Statutory Instrument bringing into effect the changes announced in Finance Act 2024 relating to the Film Tax Credit. The enhancements announced in Finance Act 2024, referred to as the Scéal Uplift, provide for an uplift of 8 percent to the tax credit for small to medium budget feature film productions. Finance Act 2024 introduced enhancements to section 481 TCA 1997 which provides relief, by means of a corporation tax credit (Film Tax Credit), for the qualifying costs of certain audio-visual productions. The uplift will result in a tax credit rate of 40 percent for feature films for projects with a maximum qualifying expenditure of up to €20 million. As a result of the commencement order, the enhanced relief took effect from 2 May 2025 and is subject to the sunset clause of 31 December 2028 provided for in section 481 TCA 1997.

Revenue has issued a further warning of fraudulent emails, text messages and phone calls appearing to come from them seeking personal information from taxpayers.  The fraudulent messages typically relate to tax refunds and the immediate payment of tax to avoid criminal proceedings and are a phishing attempt. Revenue has confirmed that MyEnquiries, the secure online service, is used to send, receive and track correspondence. Examples of fraudulent emails and texts are included in the release. Revenue also advises individuals to reset passwords if account details have been provided in response to an email, text or phone call and to contact their bank or credit card company if bank details have been provided.

Revenue has updated the Agent's Guide to the Collector General’s Division to include new content and to update existing information. While the guidance is primarily intended to be of assistance to tax agents, it will be of assistance to any customer who transacts business with the Collector-General’s Division. The following new sections have been added to the manual: Non-resident repayment of Relevant Contracts Tax, International claims, E-linking process for agents and taxpayers, and EU VAT modernisation. The sections which have been updated are as follows: Notification of representation of properties for LPT, Late payments and interest charges, Tax relief at source (mortgage interest and medical insurance), Unregistered VAT repayments, and Due dates for submission of returns and payments. References to fixed direct debits have been removed from the guidance.

In advance of the Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) pay and file deadline of 23 May 2025, Revenue has produced a series of prerecorded general information sessions on RZLT. The recordings cover a step by step guide dealing with site registration, and RZLT return and payment processes which can be accessed on Revenue’s RZLT Hub.