7 November 2025
OECD publishes mutual agreement procedure and advanced pricing agreement statistics
The OECD has released the latest in its annual series of mutual agreement procedure (MAP) statistics, looking at the effectiveness and timeliness of dispute resolution mechanisms within double tax treaties for the calendar year 2024, and highlighting the continued importance of MAP as a mechanism to relieve double taxation. For transfer pricing cases (including profit attribution to permanent establishments), the average time to resolve a case was 30.9 months (down from 32.0 months in 2023). For non-transfer pricing cases, the average time to close a case increased to 24.5 months (up from 23.4 months in 2023). The OECD also released advance pricing arrangement (APA) statistics for 2024. 80 jurisdictions reported allowing bilateral APAs, with 49 actively managing cases. The statistics show an aggregate of over 4,100 cases in inventory, and an average duration of 39.6 months (up from 36.8 months in 2023) to agree an APA. 845 APAs were granted during 2024 (down from 860 in 2023).
Individual statistics for cases involving the United Kingdom are available here. The number of UK transfer pricing MAPs closed in 2024 was 113, and 130 new cases were submitted. The average time taken to close post-2016 transfer pricing cases in the UK in 2024 was 25.8 months. The UK had 175 APA cases in its inventory as at 31 December 2024, and the average time taken to grant an APA was 53.0 months.
Supreme Court refuses permission to appeal: Tax treatment of distributions from overseas company’s share premium
The Supreme Court’s website has been updated to indicate that the taxpayer has been refused permission to appeal in Beard v HMRC, concerning the tax treatment of distributions received by a UK-resident individual from a Jersey limited company derived from its share premium account. The case concerns section 402 Income Tax (Trading and Other Income) Act 2005 (ITTOIA 2005) which brings dividends received from a non-UK resident company into the charge of income tax, subject to an exclusion for ‘dividends of a capital nature’. In May 2025, the Court of Appeal (CoA) unanimously dismissed the appeal of the taxpayer.
The CoA considered the meanings of ‘dividends’ and ‘dividends of a capital nature’ established under case law. In line with this case law, the CoA focussed on the foreign company law and company law mechanisms that governed the relevant payments. In this case, this was Part 17 of the Companies (Jersey) Law 1991, which since 2008 has provided for a mechanism to make share premium amounts more freely distributable. The CoA agreed with the First-tier and Upper Tribunals that the cash dividends received by the taxpayer through this mechanism did not constitute ‘dividends of a capital nature’ and were therefore not excluded from UK income tax. The CoA also agreed that a separate ‘in specie’ distribution of a non-cash asset, paid under the same Jersey company law mechanism, was also a dividend not of a capital nature and thus also correctly subject to income tax.
Welsh Detailed Draft Budget and consultation on changes to Welsh Tax Acts published
On 3 November 2025, the Welsh government published its Detailed Draft Budget, the second stage of its Draft Budget for the 2026-27 tax year. The Detailed Draft Budget sets out the Welsh government’s spending plans, including the allocation of funding to the Welsh Revenue Authority (WRA). The Welsh government’s tax policy proposals were set out in the Outline Draft Budget presented on 14 October 2025.
Separately, the Welsh government has published a consultation on a number of proposed technical changes to the Welsh Tax Acts, intended to “clarify, enhance and future-proof the Welsh Tax Acts to enable the WRA to continue to collect taxes as effectively as possible and support wider public service delivery in Wales.” The Welsh Tax Acts include legislation for land transaction tax (LTT) and landfill disposals tax, as well as for the establishment of the WRA and its powers to collect the Welsh taxes. A number of technical changes to LTT are proposed, including to group relief rules to specify when consideration provided from outside of the group will not result in the withdrawal of relief, unless the transaction is part of a scheme to save LTT. The consultation closes on 26 January 2026.
TSI Instruments Limited: Import VAT recovery by a non-owner
TSI Instruments Limited (TSI) imported scientific equipment into the UK for repair and servicing. TSI claimed the import VAT it paid on importation as input tax. HMRC considered that, in accordance with its internal manual VIT3300, TSI was not entitled to input tax recovery, as it was not the owner of the goods, and assessed TSI for £8.5m. The First-tier Tribunal (FTT) has rejected TSI’s appeal against HMRC’s assessments. TSI argued that the import VAT could be recovered on the basis that there was a direct and immediate link between the costs of importation and TSI’s taxable transactions, being the repair services. In other words, import VAT could be claimed not only where there is a link between the cost or value of imported goods and a taxable person’s outputs, but that the link can also be established where the taxable person bears the costs of importation. The FTT disagreed, finding that, under EU and UK law, TSI was not entitled to claim the import VAT as it was not the owner of the goods, and the cost or value of the imported goods was not reflected in the price of the repairs carried out by TSI. The FTT considered that although the FTT’s 2023 decision in Piramal Healthcare UK Limited also concerned import VAT recovery by a non-owner, the decision was of limited assistance, as it did not consider the distinction between the costs of importation and the cost or value of the goods imported. The FTT dismissed TSI’s appeal. (Contact: Gareth Pritchard)
EMEA Dbriefs webcasts
The next EMEA Dbriefs tax webcast is on Tuesday 11 November 2025 at 12.00 GMT/13.00 CET. In Should payroll be the only constant in a world of change?, hosted by Melanie North, our panel will share insights and practical guidance to help successful payroll and workforce management agility in the face of transformation. We will discuss topics including transforming payroll during business change and leveraging technology for global payroll success.
A further EMEA Dbriefs tax webcast, Exit readiness – key tax priorities to be aware of in advance of a transaction, will take place on Wednesday 12 November 2025, at 13.00 GMT/14.00 CET. Our panel, with input from tax experts in Germany and the Netherlands, will look at exit strategies in today’s dynamic tax landscape. We will discuss how tax fits into the wider transaction process, structural considerations, how to prevent value leakage and managing the risk of tax uncertainties, as well as common pitfalls and diligence risks.