SAM10010 - Appeals, postponements and reviews: appeals: who can make an appeal?

An appeal may be accepted if it is made by

  • A taxpayer
  • A person acting in capacity
  • An authorised agent acting on behalf of the taxpayer

Partnerships

An appeal in respect of a penalty imposed upon a partnership must be made by a nominated partner on behalf of all the relevant partners see subject ‘Maintain Taxpayer Record: Nominated Partner’ (SAM101290), or by an agent acting for the partnership / nominated partner. It is important that the appellant is identified as a nominated partner before the appeal is accepted as the appeal may be rejected if it is not made by the nominated partner or his/her successor or authorised agent.

An appeal can be accepted from an agent who acts for all of the partners but if it is not practical to check this (some partnerships may have hundreds of partners), you should issue SEES form SA670 to confirm the name of the nominated partner and make a Free Format Note on the Signals page on the Partnership record to say either

  • ‘DD/MM/YY SA670 received. Nominated partner is [enter partners name]’

Or

  • ‘YY/YY box 11.3 shows nominated partner as [enter partners name]’

An appeal can also be accepted from a partner who is shown at box 11.3 on an internet filed return for either the year of the appeal, or the preceding year. For paper returns, where there is no name in box 11.3 on the return, the appeal can be accepted from the person who signed the return but if a comparison with the paper return is not possible, you should issue SEES form SA670 to confirm the nominated partners name before taking action. However you should be aware that there may be situations where you receive appeals for several years from different partners because it was a different nominated partner who submitted that particular years return.

In cases where the nominated partner has died during the year, the successor to the nominated partner is generally the person nominated by a majority of the other partners (which will include the personal representative of the deceased partner) so in these circumstances SEES form SA670 must be issued and a note made of the new nominated partner before taking action.

Advice on the action to take to deal with an appeal is available on the following action guides –

  • Late Filing Combined Penalty Appeals 2010-11 onwards - Individuals
  • Late filing combined penalty appeals 2010-11 onwards – partnerships

Trusts

An appeal against a penalty imposed against a trust will normally be made by the principal acting trustee on behalf of all the relevant trustees.