The summit provided a great opportunity to meet many HR specialists across a range of industries. From our numerous discussions with delegates, we have outlined below some of the key themes that emerged:
- A number of employers are starting to turn their attention to the new employer obligations that are set to apply from 6 April 2020 in respect of off-payroll workers. For employers who engage off-payroll workers (e.g. contractors, self-employed, consultants etc.) via a personal service company, there may be a requirement to operate PAYE and NIC. Further detail on the changes can be found at here.
- UK employers who employ people internationally and in countries in which they have no corporate presence (e.g. a branch or subsidiary) are facing numerous challenges in terms of engaging employees overseas compliantly. This is not surprising given the numerous considerations such as local labour law, non-UK payroll, determining whether the individual’s work triggers a corporate presence in the overseas territory etc. We were able to reassure attendees that there are ways to manage this compliantly and cost effectively.
- As you may expect, many employers (and especially those employing EU nationals in the UK and/or UK nationals in the EU) raised concerns around Brexit. This is not surprising, given the political twists and turns. Most employers are adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach to Brexit, although some are actively planning and assessing whether they may be impacted from an immigration and social security perspective in the event of a ‘no deal’.
As you may expect, many employers raised concerns around Brexit.
To complement our attendance at the Summit, we also undertook a survey of HR directors on employment tax reporting and compliance. A summary analysis of the key these emerging from our survey can be found at here.
The survey was undertaken across a wide range of UK organisations of all sizes to understand the challenges they face when it comes to employer tax compliance and our paper also provides our insights in this regard.
For more information, please contact Lee Hamilton.