Headaches....

[Grantica R&D]

As an R&D partner, I'm keen to know what headaches, annoyances and general peeves people have when claiming their R&D tax relief. What can be done better? What works well? What's the process like with your current partner in terms of communication, fee structure etc?

Also, if a claim has been taken to enquiry, how was it resolved and how long did it take?

 

[Ozzy]

if a claim has been taken to enquiry, how was it resolved and how long did it take?

This is being discussed on this thread where you can join with;

R&D claims getting rejected out of hand

We do a fair chunk of R&D - I employ a full time chemist and x2 lab assistants whose main responsibility is to develop new product (we manufacture car, boat and bicycle care products) and appraise performance of ours and our competitors products. Long story cut short. We've claimed under the...

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I cannot add any value to your other questions because, after using a couple of R&D specialists, I decided to do it in-house. I personally didn't see any value in continuing to outsource it.

 

[Grantica R&D]

I cannot add any value to your other questions because, after using a couple of R&D specialists, I decided to do it in-house. I personally didn't see any value in continuing to outsource it.

I think that's fair enough - a lot of companies do it in house or with their accountant. The only problem is, unless the accountant is a tax advisor as well, a lot of expenditure is missed. One example is with an engineering company we work with, their accountant missed out 49k of benefit to them because they didn't know what to claim for wholly. It does have it's benefits working with a partner who specialises but I can see why places don't outsource, or even claim! It's a whole different world now haha!

 

[Ozzy]

The only problem is, unless the accountant is a tax advisor as well, a lot of expenditure is missed.

Ours are tax advisers, thankfully. My gripe was that the consultants didn't know our business inside out. We had to do all the writing up and prep work anyway, so all they did was allocate the percentages to the various expenditures and put everything we prepared into a pretty PowerPoint slide show for HMRC — and they took thousands as a cut of the claim for that PowerPoint show.

However, it pushed me to study the the R&D claims process, the rules around it, such as what is allowable and the allowances. I wouldn't have done that if I didn't feel we were not getting value for money.

 

[Grantica R&D]

Ours are tax advisers, thankfully. My gripe was that the consultants didn't know our business inside out. We had to do all the writing up and prep work anyway, so all they did was allocate the percentages to the various expenditures and put everything we prepared into a pretty PowerPoint slide show for HMRC — and they took thousands as a cut of the claim for that PowerPoint show.

However, it pushed me to study the the R&D claims process, the rules around it, such as what is allowable and the allowances. I wouldn't have done that if I didn't feel we were not getting value for money.

ah man - that's exactly how Grantica was born! Frustration! The founders hated doing the reports themselves, so we now have 3 technical report writers for our clients, 2 financial people that calculate numbers etc and then an ex-HMRC inspector to certify that work to make sure its up to scratch before submission. Seems to be working thankfully as well.