So, how much do they actually owe? Has Osborne let them off the hook?

http://blogs.forbes.com/parmyolson/2010/10/28/behind-vodafones-multi-billion-dollar-tax-flap/

And why is George Osborne getting involved with Vodafone’s tax issues in India?

Any chance they could write off the few hundred that I owe them?

Also apparently the tax office has an unopened stash of mail, which runs into millions of items apparently. Their cheque is probably in one of them!!!!

What? I know certain newspapers aren’t covering this, but nobody on here wants to talk about this?

we’ve had disputes with them before at work for not paying bills

It would seem that it is a case of clever (?dodgy) accounting/legal maneuvering in big European deals rather than a blatant refusal to pay a bill that dropped through the letterbox.
These shenanigans appears to be the modus operandi for big business while the proletariat pick up the bill.

I’ve not used shenanigans in a post before…
Felt nice.

Its why all corporates have Tax Departments who seem to know tax law better than the governments that created them…

The UK tax legislation is a pile of A5 books printed in small type (6 point, at a guess) on “bible” style thin paper but still is a stack of books about a foot tall. Probably about 3/4 of that is corporate tax in one form or another. Start looking cross-border and it becomes massively complex as you have tax laws of 2 or more countries. On top of that there is Revenue Practice, Manuals and a heap of Case Law.

We’ll probably never know the ins and outs of the Vodafone/ Mannesman acquisition (I’d be surprised if anyone – Revenue, Vodafone or any advisors – now wholly understands how it was supposed to work at the time. Even if it was superbly well documented it’ll be too complex for any team to unpick all of the work done at the time 8 years down the line.)

As for the other stuff in the article, Vodafone would have to have a prudent provision for any possible settlement in their accounts. It’s quite common for this to be a lot less than the final settlement. Basically they would have filed their returns based on a favourable interpretation, but in the accounts based their tax on a less favourable one – the difference is the “provision”. This has to be prudent, so more towards worst case scenario than the filing position and that will be why they have settled for less than their provision. HMRC take little notice of accounts provisions when looking at contentious issues as they generally recognise that the accounting standards require you to do things in a certain way that is somewhat divorced from the technical arguements they are having with you.

India – Vodafone seem to be saying they did things in line with established practice and Indian tax authorities are going back on this. Also, in the UK a company won’t have to pay tax until issue is settled (though the underpayment will carry interest) – in normal circumstances you would never get a demand to pay HMRC’s calculated tax on a disputed issue upfront, for example. All very messy.

And George Osbourne will have got involved as Vodafone is a large British plc and it is largely in the government’s interest that it does well and thrives.

And George Osbourne will have got involved as Vodafone is a large British plc and it is largely in the government’s interest that it does well and thrives.

that sounds awfully like the boys looking after the boys to me