HMRC = Sneaky Bastards?

Another work-related post, but slightly interesting. Especially as I'm starting with an accusation.

HMRC - J'accuse!!

It's my contention that The Revenue are employing undercover 'spies' to call up accountancy firms, pretending to be someone with a lot of money in offshore banks. They say that they have not paid tax on the interest of that money, and are worried about getting screwed by the Revenue. They then ask
a) is that the sort of thing you can help with?
...and, crucially...
b) do you have any other clients in a similar position to me?

Hmmm.....

As you may not be aware, HMRC have announced an Amnesty on offshore tax havens. They're basically saying "admit what money you've got and where you've got it, and we'll only take 20/30% of it - if you don't declare it by the somethingth of November, and we find out about it later, we'll fuck you for even more and press criminal charges".

However, there's a fair bit of administration involved in tracking this sort of thing down... a lot, in fact. They call it 'forensic accounting' - basically the Dexter/CSI of the tax world - and it makes it much easier for them IF they know where to start looking.

So, J'accuse HMRC of systematically calling up UK accountancy firms, and (attempting to) trick them into revealing whether any of their clients are in that position.

Sneaky bastards, like I said.

If this is not true, then by all means HMRC - tell me to remove this accusation, and I'll think about it.

Calls recieved at 13.43, 14.29, and 14.58 on 3rd Nov from a "Mr. Williams", from a withheld number, who couldn't remember the surname of the person who introduced him to our firm.