Revenue issues final warning notice on debt scheme: don’t pay and you’ll face interest rates of 10pc

June 13, 2022
|In Taxation, VAT
|By Angela O'Leary
The Revenue Commissioners last week began issuing final debt warehouse warning notices to taxpayers with outstanding tax returns.
The notice outlines that taxpayers must file all outstanding tax returns within 10 days of the notice in order to continue to avail of the debt warehousing scheme.
Where returns are not filed within the 10-day period, the taxpayer will lose the benefits of the debt warehouse scheme.
This means that all the reduced interest rates on unpaid tax from the pandemic will face a new, much higher rate.
Almost 105,000 businesses were continuing to avail of Revenue’s tax debt warehousing scheme at the end of January, owing the tax authorities more than €3bn in total.
The letters said: “According to Revenue’s records, you have outstanding tax returns. To retain your entitlement to the Debt Warehousing Scheme, you must ensure that all returns are filed within 10 days of the date of this notice.
“If you do not file these returns within the next 10 days, you will lose the benefits of the scheme.
“This means that all your debt will be payable immediately by you, and the normal interest rates of 8pc or 10pc will apply instead of the scheme’s reduced interest rates of 0pc and 3pc.”
 
Revenue told accountants that it has improved its Phased Payment Arrangement (PPA) system to allow both warehoused debt and non-warehoused debt to be included in one PPA.
 
It will also allow taxpayers who currently have a Phased Payment Arrangement to include their warehoused debt as part of that arrangement at the reduced interest rate of 0pc and 3pc as applicable.
The facility was made available last week.