Thursday, June 13, 2013

HMRC and IVA standard terms

Are we the only people who still lament the departure of Dick Ivory from VAS? Although we did our best not to bother him, it was always good to have a name to write to when trying to fathom out the deeper recesses of HMRC policy and thinking. Since Dick left we have been kept in the dark, possibly on purpose, but we would like to find out whether HMRC are now prepared to vote in favour of arrangements that use the protocol standard terms, or whether they are continuing to require that the R3 standard terms are used, except as modified by them.

From what we can work out, in many Protocol IVAs where their vote is not significant, HMRC will often simply fail to vote. However, we have seen cases this year where non-Protocol cases that were just using the protocol standard terms because they were familiar to the creditors and more flexible to use, especially when faced with quarterly dividend payments, were modified by HMRC. The most worrying standard modification we saw required that the arrangement operate under the old R3 standard terms, but we asked about that in our last technical update and nobody else reported seeing it. What we would like to know, however, is what HMRC are doing now. Have you seen them insist on R3 standard terms recently? If so, which version did they insist on? Have you seen them vote in a case where the Protocol terms were used but not insist on the change of standard terms?

Of course the new question that we would really love an answer to, is do you have a name and email address for a manager or similar contact at VAS who is prepared to fill the great Mr Ivory’s boots?