Back in April 2015, HMRC requested that employment intermediaries – such as recruitment agencies and recruitment firms – should provide details of the payments made on placements that are not paid via the intermediaries PAYE scheme. These quarterly reports are known as the Intermediary Reporting and provide HMRC with the details of the candidate, the amounts paid, and how the candidate was paid (umbrella, limited or self-employed).

These reports have been a requirement for recruitment agencies to submit each quarter for over six years if they have more than one temporary, contract or interim worker paid outside the agency PAYE payroll.

However, over the past few years, TBOS has taken on several existing recruitment agency clients via our TBOS Complete solution. We have asked their previous back-office/accountants for their intermediary reporting details with no response. Through further investigation, it appears that the agencies previous advisors/accountants were not aware of the requirement to submit these returns each quarter. We then have to break the news that the agency may be subject to fines and penalties once we submit the first return should HMRC investigate this further.

The fines for non-submission of an Intermediary Report are £250 for the first offence, £500 for the second offence and £1,000 for the third and subsequent offences. There are also additional penalties of up to £600 per day if this continues.

As part of our ongoing TBOS Complete solution, we ensure that all of our agencies providing temporary, contract and interim workers paid via limited, umbrella or self-employed companies are submitting their quarterly Intermediary Reporting on time.

Also, as TBOS only looks after the back office and accounting services of recruitment agencies, we believe we are experts in this field and ensure that our clients are kept up to date and compliant with legislation that may affect their recruitment company.

Please contact our office if you would like further information on how we can help your agency keep up with its HMRC obligations.