The Chancellor of the Exchequer presented the 2017 Spring Budget yesterday, and whilst his actual speech was relatively benign, the backup policy documents contained some additional, more interesting comment.
Amongst the brief comments provided was a statement identifying the government’s awareness of UK
employers paying image rights payments under separate contractual arrangements to employment income. This practice is most heavily associated with Football, but is also prevalent in other professional sports such as rugby and cricket.The Budget statement confirms that HMRC are to publish guidelines for such employers who make image rights payments, with the intention of improving the clarity of the existing rules. There is no mention of what we can expect in the guidance, or when we should expect it. However, it is likely that any guidance from HMRC will incorporate the current practices developed by HMRC with leading premier league football clubs, such that image rights payments should be linked (and restricted to) to both the commercial revenues of the club and the commercial value of the employee.
Jon Elphick is a Director of Mark Davies & Associates and an international tax advisor. He provides tax advice to private individuals on complex international structures, and has advised a number of UK resident foreign athletes on their UK tax affairs, with a specific focus on structuring their image rights arrangements in a tax efficient manner.
Jon comments:
“Although it is unlikely that any guidance provided by HMRC will be ground breaking, it is certainly a welcome step from the government towards introducing a consistent and known approach towards taxing image rights arrangements. It will certainly help in enabling athletes and sports clubs alike to plan their image right arrangements with a bit more certainty and comfort”.
At this stage, it does not appear that such guidance would affect athletes operating on a self-employed basis.
Jon and the team at Mark Davies & Associates are available for interviews, commentary and advice on the tax position of image rights arrangements, as well as other private client tax matters. For further information, please contact:
Jon Elphick
0203 008 8100
info@mdaviesassociates.com
NOTES TO EDITORS
Jon Elphick
Jon is a Tax Director at Mark Davies & Associates, having joined the firm in January 2014 from a Mayfair
based international tax practice. He is an International Tax Advisor who specialises in providing proactive and practical advice to UK resident, international private clients. Jon’s primary focus is on advising non-domiciled individuals on their UK tax affairs, but he also advises international private clients on inward investment into the UK. Jon has extensive experience in advising on the use of offshore trust and company structures for estate planning and tax purposes. Jon is a co-author with Mark Davies of the chapter on Tax Planning for Non-UK Domiciled People, published in Tolley’s Tax Planning.
About Mark Davies & Associates
We are an award winning boutique firm of Chartered Tax Advisers based in central London who focus exclusively on international non-dom taxpayers. Our team of specialist advisers hold qualifications from the Chartered Institute of Taxation, STEP and ACA. Our collective knowledge of tax pertaining to international clients is constantly updated in response to the rapidly changing UK tax laws; and through our publications and commentary we are thought leaders in our chosen field of the taxation of foreign domiciliaries. Some of us are “non-doms” ourselves, speaking a variety of foreign languages and well placed to understand the importance of a reassuring guide through the complex laws of an adopted country. Our aim is to provide exceptional service to our clients through a responsive and individually tailored approach. Mark Davies & Associates has been shortlisted by STEP as Boutique Firm of the Year 2015/16 and Tolley’s Taxation Awards as Best Independent Consultancy Firm 2016.