Tax changes for short-term business visitors - initial equality impact assessment
Published 29 December 2020
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Project overview
Short-term business visitors
Short-term business visitors (STBVs) are individuals who are not resident in the UK for tax purposes, but who make business trips to the UK which equate to a workday limit of 30 days or less in a given tax year.
Employers with STBVs from foreign branches can currently use the PAYE special arrangement. This allows collection of tax on an annual basis rather than monthly, meaning employers must report the STBV’s annual tax liability by 19 April using the Month 12 Full Payment Submission (FPS) and pay their tax liability by 21 April.
What is changing
From April 2020, the UK workday limit will increase from 30 to 60 work days.
Additionally, both the reporting and payment deadlines for the PAYE special arrangement will also be extended to the 31 May following the end of the relevant tax year.
Project objectives
The main objective is to reduce the administrative burden currently placed on those UK employers who have the existing PAYE special arrangement for STBVs (under the 2015 terms) when bringing their overseas branch staff to work in the UK on a short-term basis:
- to enhance employer understanding of the STBVs reforms, before April 2020
- to provide clear information to assist employers in self-assessing their eligibility to make a claim to enter into the new arrangement, by April 2020
- to provide clear guidance on the changes and the additional information that will be required, by April 2020
Customer groups affected
The customer group that will be impacted by the change is employers: currently 400 employers are registered for this special arrangement.
What customers will need to do
As a result of this change, employers need to be aware that a PAYE special arrangements for STBVs exists and where the terms are met mean that the UK workday limit for STBVs will increase from 30 days to 60 days and that they now need to report this to HMRC by 31 May following the end of the relevant tax year (rather than by 19 April).
Customers will access this service via PAYE (through their payroll).
When will customers need to do this?
The reporting and payment deadlines for the special PAYE regime will be extended from 19 April to 31 May following the end of the tax year. The first return will be due under the new terms on 31 May 2021.
Assessing the impact
We assessed the equality impacts on all the protected characteristic groups in line with the Equality Act and Public Sector Equality Duty and section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act:
- racial groups
- disabled and not disabled
- gender
- gender reassignment
- sexual orientation
- age
- religion or belief
- pregnancy and maternity
- marriage and civil partnership
- people with dependents and those without
- political opinion (for Northern Ireland only)
- people who use different languages (Including Welsh Language and British Sign Language)
We do not anticipate that there will be impacts on customers within any of the protected characteristic groups. Extra support will be provided as required.
Opportunities to promote equalities
We have considered opportunities to promote equalities and good relations between people in each of the protected characteristic groups and those outside of that group. None have been identified within the scope of this project.