Reckon thats were Allam's loan has gone. Think I'd sooner be in debt to the HMRC than Mr Allam.

Well. It [iused[/i to be hidden under a big umbrella. Not sure if it's still there.

Amen. [iThat[/i clock is ticking for sure.

Mick, Hull FC's EBT Payments are from the last 10 years. We only came into SL in 2007. So considering your debt to HMRC is 1 million We'd be generous to say our bill would even reach 500k.

Are EBT debts only applicable to Super League clubs? That is a genuine question, btw - I don't know.

Surely Rovers had a few overseas players in the Championship who presumably were on full time contracts (on much smaller salaries than SL players, of course).

Just glad Hull are being proactive on this.

I'd presume rovers really don't have any ebt liability or surely it would have been commented on in their accounts?

The potential liability to Hull would have been factored into pearson's purchase price so he's already £1m up on the deal so won't be bothered about doing some of that long overdue investment

There's nothing to say that Championship clubs won't have built up some EBT liability, albeit on a smaller scale than the SL clubs. The tax loophole was open to any business and although the wages are smaller in the lower leagues so is the income.

I'm not sure. Was our liability reported in our accounts?

I think there was a comment in the notes

No, the accounts didn't have this as a note. Leeds accounts reference EBTs as something they use, but not as a potential liability; however, they file full accounts rather than our abbreviated ones. Previously most clubs have referenced image rights as a potential liability but this time round don't seem to.

Ours is £1m now it was reported by Jmaes Smailes to have been £2.5 before Pearson worked his magic!

Then if the figure of £1M for us is right and if they get the same deal that you have set a president for then that will be 2/5 of the origional figure or £400K

what makes you think you can negotitate the same deal, you don't have the cash to pay a lump sum.

After reading 4 pages, can I ask a serious (but probably silly) question please?

What is EBT liability, how does it come about and have other club's released their figures??

Love it....would that be another of Hudge's many job titles?

HMRC don't do precedents. That's why Leeds are having to fight a court case to try and get the same deal on image rights that RU clubs get.

Does this mean we actually made losses really for the last 6 years and not profits?

Why would it?

Because we've been using a tax loophole to reduce our outgoings

For a genius you do ask some stupid questions

I suspect its more likely that they've been using a tax loophole to boost the money going in to the players pockets rather than the actual amount being paid out by the club. If what I suspect has been happening is the case then technically what we have been paying to the players needs grossing up by the tax that has been "avoided" and we have probably been breaching the salary cap for the last x years.

I don't know anything about the image rights case but the Inland Revenue do have to treat all tax payers equally so effectively they do set precedents

Exactly. Player X, let's call him shaun, wants £150k a year but we offer £120k, a chunk of which goes into an EBT, saving him £30k in tax. We get our player for £120k and he effectively gets his £150k.

Sounds like we've been "saving" £200k+ a year for the last 10 years

Agreed although I suspect that the £2million being banded about by the press includes interest and penalty charges and in reallity the amount that has been avoided/saved is nearer the £1million settlement figure

I thought the amount you can pay into EBT is capped at about 25% of overall income?

As far as I am aware there is no limit on the amount that can be put in to an EBT arrangement. THere are issues with paying the money out and the tax consequences relating thereto but there are various schemes available to do this, particularly when it comes to none residents and my guess is that it is one of these that the club have been using.