| The British Treasury considers letters from work to friends to be “benefits received in kind” The “white collar” workers of Foggy Albion were seriously frightened by British fiscals. The UK Treasury intends to make a paid Internet window to the big world, which all clerks receive along with their office computer. It is noteworthy that in the use of work computers for personal purposes - communicating with friends by e-mail, searching for information about recreation, interactive games and even viewing porn sites - the financial department saw not a violation of labor discipline, but a new source of replenishment of the state budget. The other day, the online publication Lenta.Ru, with reference to The Times of London, reported on the initiative of the British Ministry of Finance to tax the use of office computers for personal purposes.
Back in March, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, “without much fanfare,” as a British newspaper writes, sent to Parliament a bill for a new tax on the “misuse” of computers. It is noteworthy that it is proposed to tax not only the hired clerks themselves, but also their employers. The use of a working tool outside the direct purposes of business was qualified by the financial department as “benefit received in kind.” And with this, according to the Ministry of Finance, employees will have to pay income tax, and companies will have to pay the corresponding insurance premiums.
According to Treasury calculations, if a computer costs a company £2,000, an employee who sends letters to friends from work will receive a receipt for £160 at the end of the year, and his employer will have to pay £51.2 in social tax. It was proposed to exempt from tax only those companies in which “the personal use of a computer was not significant,” although the British Ministry of Finance did not explain how fiscal officials would measure “especially large amounts” of off-duty correspondence and traffic. But apparently, few exceptions were expected - after all, Gordon Brown intended to replenish the kingdom's budget from this new source by as much as 2.2 billion pounds over three years.
Even before the bill was discussed in the House of Commons, the document was severely criticized among experts. True, in fairness it must be said that everyone was not worried about the fate of poor clerks who will have to fork out £160 a year for the right to be distracted by visiting their favorite sites. Anne Redstone, chair of the Personal Tax Division at the Tax Institute, called the Treasury's initiative a "new bureaucratic burden" for businesses, who will now be forced to create a kind of police force to monitor personal use of the office computer and separate the "significant" from the "insignificant."
As a result of such a violent reaction, the financial department backed down. On the eve of the discussion of the new document in the House of Commons of the British Parliament, The Times received a statement from the Ministry of Finance, which states that the new law will affect practically no one. Now Treasury experts say virtually all private use of work computers should be considered "non-essential." Therefore, according to the newspaper’s source in the Ministry of Finance, “the chances of collecting tax from someone for the personal use of a work computer are almost zero.”
Meanwhile, Ms. Redstone continues to criticize the document. She said ambiguity in the law could harm employees. Clear guidance is needed for employers and employees so they can definitively know whether they have such a tax liability or not, she said. The British Chamber of Commerce is also strongly opposed to the new rules. Its representatives say: "Including a measure like this in the budget will affect their ability to compete effectively." Irina BELASHEVA |
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