IR35 scam email targets IT contractors

Scammers are exploiting fears about IR35 by posing as a research firm that claims to gather preliminary data for the taxman on contractors about to be officially caught by the costly rule.

Claiming to earn a fee from HM Revenue & Customs, the spurious outfit approaches by email, inviting the contractor to provide details to contest its ‘inside IR35’ “findings.”

If the contractor refuses to reject the assessment within 14 days, “we will gather further evidence and submit to HMRC with you details” at the end-user workplace, the email says.

“Your are essentially an employee given your duration at ‘X’,” its author states in a bid to seem IR35-savvy and official, thwarted by the grammatical error at the start of the sentence.

Even more glaring is the mistaken spelling of ‘deployed’ (spelt “deploayed”), which the email – called IR35 HMRC Reference – makes use of in a continued bid to feign legitimacy.

Shown the email, available online,a Revenue spokesman told CUK it had “definitely not been endorsed” by HMRC which, he added, was unaware of it, contrary to its claims.

After accusing the recipient of dodging tax, the sender bluffs: “We are an agency that gets a % of all tax paid over to HMRC through information that we intend to pass to them.”