Part of the Parish

Look away now.  The Friends of the Hoy Kirk has recruited an ‘Agent’ to submit its return to HMRC regarding Corporation Tax.  It owes no such tax but still has to make a return.  The Agent started to complete the necessary information but did not have access to the charity number.  We don’t have it.  Therefore I called HMRC (on hold for 27 minutes) and spoke to three employees to ask for the charity number.  Finally they concluded that we are not registered with HMRC.  Which begs the question – ‘so why have we received a demand for back tax’?  Which I posed.  There was no answer.  Things then got well beyond Kafkaesque.  I was told our Agent would have to submit a Form 64/8.  They also informed me that the FoHK is not a registered charity.  Despite the fact that I had in my hand the Articles of Association of the Charity 23 previous letters from HMRC.  To a charity that doesn’t exist.  However the really exciting news is that I’ve been invited to the HMRC Corporation Tax Office Party.  Which doesn’t fool me as I know there’ll be no such party.  In other news I woke up and later went to bed.