As,
appropriately I suppose, the plot regarding repayment of tax paid by ALCS to
HMRC thickens, and because many of you kindly read the post and/or commented on
it, I thought I would explain the developments since last month’s post.
Firstly,
thank you to all of you who commented on the post. Penny Dolan and Rowena
House, I appreciated your supportive comments… and you’re right Rowena, if I
owed HMRC 20% of something, the boot would definitely be on the other foot and communication
between us would be far more rapid! As you mentioned Stroppy Author, it’s more
effective to get letters posted to HMRC by family (or in my case friends) in
the UK rather than from abroad, when they either seem to get ‘lost’ or considerably
delayed. Thank you Nick Garlick for sharing your experiences, I had been
considering approaching ALCS to support me in this matter and I’m sorry to hear
that you got no help from them.
As I
mentioned in last month’s blog, I sent my application form for repayment of tax
paid to HMRC by ALCS in January. This was based on me being a taxpayer in
France and therefore, under the ‘double tax’ treaty being theoretically
eligible to reclaim that tax.
A while
after posting the blog I did finally hear from HMRC! It is actually dated from
before my last blog but arrived by what’s known around here as ‘snail mail’ a
month later. However, to my surprise and frustration, they stated that, ‘We
cannot deal with you claim because it is not on the appropriate Double Taxation
claim form for France’.
Since I
cannot for the life of me understand why the form I sent them is not the or an
‘appropriate’ form I am thinking about sending them the letter below. As fellow
ABBA and Scattered Author friends I would be interested to know whether you
think it would be a good idea to actually send the letter, or if you think by
questioning them in the way I have that they may lock me in The Tower and throw
away the key!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dear Sir or
Madam,
I am writing
with regard to the letter of 29th April 2026, which I received from
#### ##### stating that I had not sent you the appropriate Double Taxation
claim form for France.
I am
enquiring about this, not only on my own behalf but because I contribute to a
blog (An Awfully Big Blog Adventure) produced and read by many authors,
particularly children’s authors, and I am aware that there are other authors
like me, living outside the UK, trying to reclaim tax paid to you by ALCS,
based on the double tax agreement. I would therefore ask if you could kindly
explain why the form I sent you is not the appropriate form as several
factors seem to indicate that it should be.
The form I
sent you is titled ‘Form DT-Individual’. I have assumed the acronym ‘DT’ refers
to the Double Tax Treaty, or am I incorrect in doing so?
Further to
this (in bold type) the sub heading of the first page of the form itself (copy
enclosed) describes it as an ‘Application for relief at source from United
Kingdom (UK) Income Tax and claim to repayment of UK Income Tax’. The form then
goes on to state that it is, ‘For use by an individual resident of a country
with which the UK has a double taxation treaty that provides for relief from UK
Income Tax on… royalties arising in the UK’. I believe that France and many
other countries in the UK have a double taxation treaty with the UK, which
would seem to further imply that this is an appropriate form to use.
In addition
to this, the accompanying notes (copy enclosed) state that one of the purposes
of the DT-Individual forms is to apply for ‘relief at source from UK income tax
on… royalties… paid from sources in the UK.’
Finally,
which I am sure you can understand made me even more certain that I was sending
you the appropriate form was that my local tax office in France kindly
confirmed my status as a French taxpayer. I assumed that if the form was
inappropriate, or unfamiliar to them, that my local tax office would not have
ratified my form. As you can no doubt understand I am reticent to send them a
second form to sign, having to explain to them also that the original form that
seemingly purports to be the correct form is not in fact appropriate. Should it
be that there is a special form to use unique to France, despite this not being
stated on the one I sent you, surely the officials at my tax office would know
this? If this is the case, it would be useful for authors based in other
countries if this idiosyncrasy applies elsewhere.
If indeed,
for some reason, which as you can see currently eludes me, the ‘Form
DT-Individual’, despite apparently strong evidence to the contrary, is indeed
incorrect, please could you explain to me which form is indeed the correct and
how I access it – I don’t want to send you a second inappropriate form! Also,
for the purposes of my fellow authors can you provide a clue as to how they
distinguish between the appropriate and
inappropriate form? It would also be intriguing to know which applicants
can actually use the form in order to reclaim royalties paid in the UK
via the double tax agreement, if any.
I, and I
suspect a number of my fellow authors, await your reply with interest.
Yours
sincerely,
…
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Are any of
you good at baking as well as having access to sturdy cake -sized metal files?
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