ECSH32813 - By letter

If you are unable to contact by any other means, you may need to make initial contact by letter. For Compliance, this means you may need to issue a Confirmation of Visit or Desk Based Intervention letter, found in the Knowledge Library with a specified date for the compliance check, giving the business at least two weeks’ notice. You may wish to issue a Notice under regulation 66 (see ECSH 71500, MLRs Regulation 66 Power to require information, access or documents), or if the business has applied to register but the application has not yet been approved, send a letter requiring further information under regulation 57(3) - see ECSH 71000, Reg 57].

Send the letter by recorded delivery and check the letter has been signed for before travelling to a visit. If not, follow the guidance at ECSH 32835 What to do if no response to initial contact.

If a business has agreed to correspond with HMRC by email, you can attach a pdf copy of a letter to an email.

How to post the letter

You can either use your regional centre’s post facility, or Central Print Service (HCPS).

Think about the message you’re sending and how you need to send it, for example whether you need evidence the letter has been delivered to the business and how quickly you need the letter to be sent.

Regional centre

Your regional centre may have local procedures – ask your team leader. If you have a letter to send and are not in a regional centre, consider whether it can be sent when you are next in the regional centre, or asking a colleague in your team to post if for you.

Central Print Service (HCPS)

Printing via HCPS means the correspondence is printed, enveloped, and mailed by a central print provider. If you select this method, you do not physically have to mail the letter yourself. The letter can be marked so it is automatically retained in Documentum, meaning you do not have to upload it to Documentum yourself.

The letter needs to be in a certain format to use HCPS. Shared Expertise to Exploit Software (SEES) is a central platform which hosts the Forms and Letters system. For guidance, see SEES Forms and Letters, HCPS, and Mailings.  

There are some letters which shouldn’t be printed using HCPS, see ‘exceptions’ guidance.

For guidance on how to print using HCPS, including a range of video tutorials, see Central Print Service Gateway.

You should also read the guidance in the FIS handbook. 

Limited companies (LTDs) and limited liability partnerships (LLPs)

For LTDs and LLPs, letters should be addressed to the registered office address, as detailed on Companies House [link to ECSH 32734 Companies House], regardless of the information held on Caseflow. You should take care as the registered office address may differ from the trading address. You can send a copy to a person at a trading address and to any authorised representatives (see ECSH 33015 Working with advisors). The address should be checked throughout the life of your case and particularly before taking any action such as issuing a decision letter. [Link to ECSH 86025    Issuing the sanction notice]. There is more guidance on Contact with customers in ECSH 111500 Addresses.