Sunday, April 27, 2008

HMRC

HMRC
It is clear that taxpayers, tax professionals and indeed those who work for HMRC are less than happy with the way that HMRC is being run;

-the failed merger with Customs,
-the ongoing "rationalisation",
-security issues, "customer" care,
-avoidance vs evasion
-and the politicisation of HMRC

are ongoing issues that need to be addressed.

The ICAEW for its part, does its best to push for improvement by lobbying the government and HMRC and by issuing press releases.

Unfortunately, the ICAEW is ham strung in its attempts to promote improvement by the fact that it still has to maintain good relations with the government, the technical nature of much of the subject matter (like it or not, the media and public are turned off by the technicalities of taxation) and that it is by its nature too polite.

Therefore I would like to remind those of you who would like to see an alternative form of critique about HMRC, less "soft cop" more "nasty cop" which is not written by committee, to visit www.hmrcisshite.com.

Those of you with self censoring browsers can visit the same site via the less "in your face" url www.hmrconline.com.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

SIDC Collaboration

The Securities Industry Development Corporation (SIDC) of Malaysia is collaborating with the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) and the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) to offer their Corporate Finance (CF) qualification programme.

In a statement yesterday, the SIDC said it would become the first CF programme provider outside the United Kingdom and Canada.

It said the CF qualification, jointly developed by the ICAEW and the CICA, was fast becoming recognised as the benchmark of success in the field of corporate finance.

Source The Daily Edge

Thursday, April 03, 2008

ICAEW Member Communications Survey II

I have just completed my twenty minute telephone interview with ReputationInc, as part of the ICAEW Member Communications Survey.

They are conducting in depth interviews with 50 members, who have been selected at random from those members who completed the online questionnaire (skewed in favour of those who who criticised or praised ICAEW communications).

A detailed report of the findings will be presented to the ICAEW Board in due course.