IHTM40153 - Non-statutory assurances and other types of certificate: cancelling a charge on property

You are unlikely to see any form of clearance certificate other than form IHT 30 and its predecessors. Rarely, however, you may be asked about certificates to cancel a charge on property. These certificates are given to cancel a notice of the HMRC charge entered on the title register of registered land. They will refer to IHTA84/S239 (1) or FA75/SCH4/PARA25 (1). If you receive such a certificate at your file you should refer it to Debt Management & Banking immediately.

Certificates such as these discharge only the property, they do not discharge the persons liable. If it subsequently appears that further tax should have been paid the persons liable are still liable, but the additional tax is not a charge on the property.

These certificates are, however, an indication to the taxpayers that the value of the property specified in them has been accepted (except for the rare case where a Land Registry Act certificate is given for leasehold property with a covering letter saying that the value is not settled). Accordingly we cannot reopen the question of value where a sale is entered into after the date of the certificate, even when negotiations for the sale must have been in hand at that date.