PLC Tax is an innovative web-based know-how service that provides up-to-date and practical guidance on business tax law and practice. It covers the UK tax aspects of a wide range of transactions, including acquisitions, reorganisations, financings, property investment and joint ventures. It also covers tax disputes and investigations, employee and owner-managed business tax planning and tax issues in cross-border transactions.
The service is largely written by the PLC Tax professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/4-376-4140) of eight tax specialists, who have extensive experience of all forms of business tax. Our resources are supplemented by materials written by tax experts at leading firms (www.practicallaw.com/1-376-4679), which are kept up-to-date by the professional support team.
The important benefits of the service include saving fee earners' time, raising the quality of their work and, where a firm has PSLs, freeing them up to focus on client or firm specific tasks, rather than generic current awareness and maintenance of basic know-how materials (see Advantages).
PLC Tax covers the tax aspects of the following main practice areas:
Corporate: M&A, joint ventures, group reorganisations, insolvency and liquidation, MBOs and private equity, enterprise investment scheme, venture capital trusts.
Finance: corporate debt, bond issues, equipment leasing, securitisation, derivatives, tax issues for lenders, Islamic finance.
Property: property investment, landlord and tenant, property development, capital allowances, construction industry scheme, stamp duty land tax.
IP&IT: exploiting intellectual property and goodwill, outsourcing.
Disputes and investigations: tax investigations, self-assessment enquiries, appeals and other tax litigation, tax group litigation orders.
Employment: employment income (PAYE and NICs), termination payments, secondments into and out of the UK.
Energy and environment: oil and gas taxation, environmental tax measures.
Financial services: investment funds, insurance premium tax, VAT on financial services.
Cross-border: tax issues affecting multinational groups, UK inbound and outbound investment, impact of EU law, overseas tax issues in corporate and finance transactions, individual residence and domicile.
Owner-managed businesses, self-employed and partnerships: shareholder and partner tax planning, directors, service companies.
Although PLC Tax is organised along transactional lines, we have not forgotten the fundamentals! We also have a series of general notes on corporation tax, income tax, capital gains tax, VAT, stamp duties, the tax disclosure rules and anti-avoidance case law. These notes give the vital background knowledge in each of these areas and will be linked to the transactional materials.
PLC Tax comprises:
Tax developments: practical summaries and analysis of key developments, delivered by RSS or e-mail and searchable on the PLC Tax website. See Updates and Daily developments e-mail.
News: weekly summary of tax stories in the news, delivered by RSS or as part of the PLC Tax weekly or monthly e-mail. See News round-up.
Overviews, checklists, quick guides, flowcharts and FAQs to guide you through the key tax issues in the most common commercial transactions. See Overviews, checklists, quick guides, flowcharts and FAQs.
A comprehensive bank of practice notes containing clear and detailed explanations of the tax law and practice relating to a wide range of commercial transactions. These are continually updated to reflect any change in law or practice. See Practice notes.
Standard documents, including a range of tax covenants and tax warranties and precedent clearance letters to HMRC, accompanied by drafting notes. See Standard documents and letters.
Detailed negotiating and drafting guides, which enable tax advisers to comment on and negotiate the tax aspects of key business agreements. See Negotiating guides.
Comprehensive coverage of Budgets, autumn statements and Finance Bills. See Budget, Pre-Budget and Finance Bill.
"Ask the Team": applying tax law and practice to a common or topical scenario. See Ask the Team.
At a glance: monthly high level summary of key tax developments, with links to more detailed analysis. See At a glance.
Key dates for corporate tax practitioners: calendar of upcoming tax developments, including consultations and cases. See Key dates for corporate tax practitioners.
Legislation trackers: follow tax legislation as it develops, from first announcement to enactment. See Legislation trackers.
Articles from PLC Magazine and Cross-border Quarterly that are of particular interest to tax specialists. See PLC Magazine articles.
Multi-jurisdictional country Q&As on tax aspects of corporate and finance transactions and a guide to leading tax lawyers in a number of jurisdictions. See Cross-border resources.
The updates cover:
Significant new cases.
Changes in HMRC practice.
Proposed, draft and new UK and EC legislation and regulations.
Consultation papers from the EC, UK government and other relevant bodies.
They are written by the PLC Tax professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/4-376-4140) who monitor and review all relevant sources daily to identify developments which are of practical significance to the practitioner. Unlike other legal information services, PLC Tax does not simply pass on raw information. We focus on the needs of the busy tax practitioner and only report on developments that are of practical significance.
Our updates include:
A summary.
Relevant background information.
An analysis of the practical impact of the development.
Each update is complete in itself, but will also include hypertext links to source materials (including transcripts for new cases), other updates and practice notes where appropriate.
You can choose to receive updates by weekly or monthly e-mail. Weekly e-mails are sent on Tuesday night and will be in your inbox on Wednesday morning. Monthly e-mails are sent on the last working day of the month and will be in your inbox the next morning.
The most recent items feature on the PLC Tax homepage, see PLC Tax. Past updates are accessible by searching on the PLC Tax website.
All PLC updates are available via RSS as they are published throughout the week (see details (www.practicallaw.com/9-501-3639) on how to subscribe to our RSS feeds), and you can follow us on Twitter at @PLCTax.
We also send out a special overnight e-mail on Budget day to all recipients of the weekly and monthly e-mails. For more detail on our Budget coverage, see Budget, autumn statement and Finance Bill (www.practicallaw.com/5-376-3630).
The updates can be integrated with subscribers' internal briefings and marketing materials.
Every working day, at around midday, we send an e-mail with links to all tax developments we have identified from monitoring a large number of information sources since we sent the previous daily developments e-mail. This e-mail also indicates which developments will be analysed in an update and included in the weekly or monthly e-mail. This e-mail will be particularly useful to PSLs, information professionals and those who need to monitor developments on a daily basis. To sign up for this e-mail, please contact your PLC account manager or the Practical Law Company helpline (www.practicallaw.com/7-102-1343).
The news round-up keeps subscribers abreast of tax-related news in the UK and abroad from a wide range of sources. The round-up summarises each news item and gives a link to the original source, to provide the most pertinent news in a concise and comprehensive format. The round-up is circulated in the weekly e-mail and by RSS, bringing essential tax news to subscribers' inboxes.
The service also gives access to a number of user-friendly overviews, quick guides, FAQs and checklists. These act as an introduction or aide memoire to ensure that important points of tax law and practice are covered in a transaction. For examples, see PLC Tax: overviews and quick guides (www.practicallaw.com/2-376-6258) and PLC Tax: checklists, flowcharts and FAQs (www.practicallaw.com/6-376-6261).
Practice notes are detailed, practical explanations of the law and practice applying to a particular topic. For experienced tax advisers, they provide up-to-date and reliable statements of law and practice. Junior practitioners will use them to gain an understanding of relevant areas not yet acquired through practice. The notes may also be used as the basis for in-house training sessions.
Practice notes are kept up-to-date by our specialist and experienced professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/4-376-4140) whenever the relevant law and practice changes.
For a list of practice notes on PLC Tax, see PLC Tax: practice notes (www.practicallaw.com/3-376-5343).
The service includes standard documents and letters. They are kept up-to-date by our professional support team (www.practicallaw.com/4-376-4140) as the relevant law and practice change.
The documents and letters are supplemented by drafting notes. These give guidance on the relevant legal and drafting issues, assisting you to adapt the example to your own or your client's specific requirements.
The standard documents and letters provide an easily searchable bank of information to save time for the busy practitioner.
Practical Law Company has developed an application allowing certain documents to be downloaded in a firm's house style, saving substantial time for fee-earners and secretaries. For more information, see PLC Firmstyle.
For a list of standard documents and letters (plus drafting notes) on PLC Tax, see PLC Tax: standard documents, letters and drafting notes (www.practicallaw.com/8-376-6260).
Negotiating guides go beyond the explanation in the drafting notes (see Standard documents and letters). They are detailed guides, which explain to tax advisers how to:
Draft common tax documents.
Tailor the document to their client's situation.
Respond to the other side's comments.
They also help practitioners commenting on a document to:
Identify the key provisions.
Draft and negotiate any necessary changes.
The negotiating guides will cover common tax contractual documents, such as tax covenants, tax warranties, tax opinions and the tax provisions in facility agreements. For examples, see PLC Tax: negotiating guides (www.practicallaw.com/8-376-6830).
Our one-stop shop coverage typically includes:
What can we expect in the Budget? A round-up of announcements that we expect, sent about a week before the Budget.
PLC Tax overnight e-mail. All recipients of the PLC Tax weekly and monthly e-mails will have in their inbox on the morning after the Budget, an e-mail summarising all the key tax announcements, with links to all relevant press releases and other official materials and to relevant PLC Tax practice notes and updates.
Comment. All recipients of the PLC Tax weekly and monthly e-mails will be e-mailed an article with the comments of leading tax practitioners on what they consider to be most interesting or important in the Budget.
Maintaining our materials. We update all PLC maintained resources, such as practice notes, overviews, standard documents and drafting notes, to reflect the Budget and the Finance Bill as soon as possible.
Legislation trackers. The PLC Tax legislation trackers track individual measures from the first press release to enactment and entry into force, see PLC Tax legislation trackers (www.practicallaw.com/4-380-9624). You can also track Finance Bills at Budget, autumn statement and Finance Bill (www.practicallaw.com/5-376-3630).
To see our previous Budget, Pre-Budget and Finance Bill coverage, see Budget, autumn statement and Finance Bill (www.practicallaw.com/5-376-3630).
"Ask the Team", launched in May 2009, is a resource in which we will provide guidance and pointers on an issue of practical importance or topical interest and illustrate how you can use PLC Tax and other PLC services to find information on similar or related topics. Each edition of "Ask the Team" can also be found under the Legal updates tab for the relevant topic area or areas covered by the particular question, and via the link in the Resources section of the PLC Tax home page. If you have any issues which you would like us to address in "Ask the Team", do e-mail us.
Our normal terms of use for PLC services (www.practicallaw.com/1-203-1075) apply.
At a glance" is a monthly high level summary of key tax developments, launched in October 2008. Each update summarises the key developments in tax law and practice over the past month, giving practitioners the main points they need to know at a glance. Links to our full legal updates are included for each item.
To view previous issues, see At a glance: archive (www.practicallaw.com/0-384-0594).
Our key dates calendar flags up key tax developments expected for the rest of the year, with links to previous PLC coverage, see Key dates for corporate tax practitioners: 2011 (www.practicallaw.com/0-504-8228). At the end of each month, we publish a summary of key developments expected in the following month, which is included in the weekly and monthly e-mails.
A series of tables that track the stages in legislating a tax proposal. We include links to press releases, consultation papers, comments from the professional bodies and parliamentary materials. We cover the following areas: compliance, corporate, disputes, employment, energy, environment, finance, intellectual property, investigations, investment structures, owner-managed businesses, property and VAT. To view the legislation trackers, see Tax legislation trackers (www.practicallaw.com/4-380-9624).
The service provides access to tax related content in PLC Magazine. Feature articles can be read on screen in simple text or PDF format, complete with graphics.
PLC Tax provides access to:
Tax on Transactions (www.practicallaw.com/8-500-0010), a multi-jurisdictional guide which consists of concise and practical summaries of tax on corporate and finance transactions in 19 jurisdictions (corporate transactions) and 10 jurisdictions (finance transactions).
Tax: PLC Which lawyer? (www.practicallaw.com/6-502-0410), which identifies leading tax counsel in 48 jurisdictions.
The Tax on Transactions multi-jurisdictional guide and PLC Which lawyer? Tax are produced by the PLC Cross-border service and are updated on a regular basis. For further information on this service, see PLC Cross-border.
We have brought together some key reading for trainees joining the tax department and for newly qualified tax lawyers, see Tax training materials for those new to tax law (www.practicallaw.com/4-503-0924).
The service is delivered through a website using advanced technology specifically developed by Practical Law Company to provide a seamless source of managed know-how to the practitioner in an easy-to-access form. Its features include:
Searching. All text is fully searchable. Searches can be refined by type of material (for example, standard documents only) or within a specified time period.
Index. Alternatively, you will be able to browse topic areas and access information via the PLC Tax homepage.
Links. Frequent hypertext links will take you seamlessly to additional information in other Practical Law Company materials and external sources, if required.
Integration. You can integrate your own know-how materials closely with those of the service while maintaining confidentiality. For further information, please contact your account manager, or call the PLC helpline (www.practicallaw.com/7-102-1343).
The Practical Law Company professional support team comprises over 90 experienced former practitioners covering a wide range of law. To view their profiles, see PLC professional support team.
The PLC Tax service has a consultation board (www.practicallaw.com/1-376-3279). They advise on the direction of the service and are used as a sounding board on points of law and practice.
The service is a cost-effective tool for any practitioner working in the area of business tax.
It helps:
Save practitioners' time and enhance their productivity.
Improve the quality, speed and accuracy of the service to clients.
Bring trainees and recently qualified advisers up to speed quickly and effectively.
Ensure practitioners are aware of relevant current developments and their practical implications.
Allow firms and legal departments with professional support lawyers to focus their resources and time on firm and client-specific know-how and finding innovative solutions to new transaction problems instead of routine information gathering.
Attract, maintain and motivate good tax practitioners.
For further information, please contact our sales department on the Practical Law Company helpline (www.practicallaw.com/7-102-1343).
