Archive - Originally posted on "The Horse's Mouth" - 2007-02-01 07:53:13 - Graham Ellis
A great weight is lifted off my shoulders this morning, in a letter from the tax office. For - goodness - a year now, they've been looking into my personal return for the 2003/04 tax year. I understand they choose some returns at random and others because they look odd, and fair enough. I guess mine looked odd; Mum had just passed away and Lisa and I picked up a number of bills and made a number of payments over subsequent months on Dad's behalf .... and it was also the year that various endowment policies that had been running so support house purchase over 25 years were repayed.
The enquiry proved much more of a drag than it should have done. Both partners at our accountants at the time passed away the following year, each suddenly and within 6 months, and that left a cold paper trail. And I had mislaid a few vital papers - my error, I know they have to be kept for seven years. Which lead to several weekends and a spell over Christmas too going through all the files looking for mis-files, from archives in the loft to old receipts stored in "the cellar". And we got down to the details of house plans for "404" to show what part was used by the business and which was personal, with scale drawings to calculate the proportion of the area that was leased out as our training centre.
And the news ... after all that work, all that investigation, they owe me a hundred quid. Me thinks that at least a little of it should go on a quiet celebration.