Judging from recent comments coming out of HMRC, it appears that there are three parties involved in the accountant-client relationship, writes Rebecca Cave.

Jim Harra, HMRC’s Director General for business tax, recently commented in an interview with Tax Journal “The key thing for me… is making sure we’ve got maximum value from having an agent in the relationship between HMRC and the taxpayer.”

He went on to say, “When an agent represents a taxpayer, we will want to know what services the agent is providing. This could be a perfectly professional basic service or it could be one which offers lots of added value… so that an agent’s client presents to us as compliant or low risk.”

I think most accountants would not see themselves as being in a relationship between HMRC and the taxpayer, but perhaps that is the reality. Do you feel you are playing the piggy-in-the-middle between your clients and HMRC?

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