The R&D Tax Credit claims scheme has long been recognised as one of the best financial innovation incentives in the UK.
There are three routes you can take with your R&D claim: doing the claim yourself, giving it to your accountant, or using a specialist R&D Tax Credit provider.
Most businesses rely on either their accountant or an R&D Tax Specialist to handle their claim. However, accountants often lack the necessary expertise, and your current Tax consultant may not be optimising your claim to the fullest extent.
If any of the following apply to you, it may be time to switch R&D consultants:
1. Your R&D specialist charges on a % basis
Many R&D Tax Credit specialists charge a fee of around 5-10% of the claim’s size. For start-ups, this is a huge chunk of the money they need to reinvest in order to scale.
This is also an issue for growing companies. As you grow, you likely spend more on R&D which in turn increases the amount you can claim back. Naturally, you don’t want this money limited.
If you are working with an advisor who charges on a percentage basis, you are likely paying more fees than you would with a specialist who charges a fixed-fee.
If you want to maximise the amount that you’ll receive from an R&D claim, it’s worth switching to an R&D Tax Advisor who works on a fixed-fee with no upfront costs.
2. You're claiming through your accountant
It might seem easier to just get your accountant to do your R&D Tax Credit claim for you, but this isn’t really the case.
Accountants may have some knowledge, but they aren’t R&D specialists. This means they aren’t aware of all eligible cost areas, and you might miss out on claiming some of your R&D expenditure.
Take Unissu for example; they asked their accountant to advise them on their R&D Tax Credit claim and, upon switching to Claim Capital’s experienced R&D Tax Credit consultants, were shocked to realise that their accountant had missed £32,000 of qualifying R&D expenditure.
Fortunately, they were able to recoup the £32,000 that was missed, but it’s a prime example of the dangers of using your accountant for your R&D claim.
If you’ve been using your accountant for your claim, it’s worth looking into switching to a specialised R&D Tax Credit consultant to make sure you avoid missing out on claiming back any cost area your accountant may not be aware of.
3. You're experiencing lengthy delays or poor service
Some R&D Tax Credit consultants take way longer than they should to get your claim to you. Here at Claim Capital, we don’t think that’s good enough.
Once we have all the information we need, we aim to complete the R&D claim in 3-5 days.
The reason for our speed is that we’re authorised to submit the claim on behalf of our clients, rather than waiting for an accountant to approve anything first.
Beyond this, we offer Advance funding. If you’re eligible for this funding (having submitted two successful claims in the past), we can advance 80% of the submitted claim.
This advance funding stops your R&D from slowing down as you wait for returns on your claims, and means that you can keep focusing on innovation and research.
If your current consultant can’t guarantee a speedy process or advance funding, it's time to make a change.
Not using a Consultant?
If you currently aren’t using a consultant – perhaps using an accountant or just doing your claims yourself, we’d strongly recommend making the jump and working with an experienced R&D Tax Credit consultant.
In light of concerns about fraud and abuse of the R&D Tax Credit system, HMRC have increased scrutiny into R&D claims.
If you don’t work with an R&D specialist on your claim, you risk heavy scrutiny:
If the financial and technical components of your R&D Tax Credit claim aren’t consistently and correctly reported, you may face a HMRC enquiry. This is something than an individual, or an accountant, cannot dedicate sufficient time to.
You may also face a HMRC enquiry at random. If this happens, you need to provide further evidence to defend your claim.
R&D Tax Credit Specialists, such as the consultants at Claim Capital, offer enquiry support services on behalf of your business at no extra cost. We’ll handle the whole enquiry for you, so all you need to do is sit back and wait for your credit return!
If you have been relying on your accountant to do your R&D claim for you, or just think your current R&D consultant isn’t quite up to scratch, then it’s definitely time for a change.
If you’re not sure about making the switch, why not check out our service in more detail? Better yet, you can arrange a call with one of our R&D Tax Specialists to get a little more insight into how switching to Claim Capital could benefit you.