The Let Property Campaign (LPC) gives you an opportunity to bring your tax affairs up to date if you are an individual who has been letting out property, whether in the UK or abroad (including your holiday home). It allows the taxpayer to make a voluntary disclosure through a specific online portal.

Provided a full and complete disclosure is made, there is usually no need to meet with HMRC face-to-face. This will be a great relief to most taxpayers, particularly those who never set out to deliberately evade tax and are anxious to put things right and get on the correct footing going forwards.

The LPC is also designed to allow other tax irregularities to be “wrapped up” together, within the same disclosure, for example sundry interest earned on the rental income deposits as well as disposals of properties concerned. It is important to remember that, just because you may not have made a profit by letting out your property, you should still be declaring the income (and all appropriate expenses) to HMRC.

In order to make an LPC disclosure, it is necessary to apply to register under the campaign. Pending acceptance into the process, HMRC typically allow the taxpayer 90 days to make a full and complete disclosure and pay what is owed.

HMRC do, however, reserve the right to refuse entry into the process, in which case they may open a compliance check or, in more serious cases, a tax fraud investigation.  This is becoming more common as HMRC obtain more information from third party sources and is clearly best avoided, if possible.

Despite the voluntary nature of an LPC registration, it is also important to remember that the making of any tax disclosure is still taken seriously. Failure to provide a full and complete disclosure of all relevant liabilities may have significant implications with HMRC.

We would therefore advise that any client considering making a disclosure of rental income speaks to our professionals before initiating contact with HMRC, to ensure that the application for registration process runs as smoothly as possible and that the LPC is the best disclosure option for you.