Possibly a totally inaccurate business valuation for IHT

[Just_Me]

Hi .. hope this is the right forum.

My mothers brother passed away earlier this year and we have a very short while before the IHT forms need to be completed and submitted.

The residential property has been valued and there were not many valuable personal belongings.

The impossible task is obtaining a valuation for his company. He co owned this with a business partner and friend. It is very successful (as far as we know) and had a turnover of around 20 million in the last filed accounts. Being honest, we aren't business minded and can't be sure we have read and understood everything correctly in the accounts/returns etc but we have been sure we have not got it so wrong. The task to send us and our solicitor a valuation of the business, lies with the company accountant. He has ignored all attempts from our solicitor and us to contact him - this has been going on for months. We literally don't know where to turn. We have also tried contacting the co owner of the business many times but have heard nothing back from him either - he is rarely in the country and seems to have left this is the accountants hands so we are not sure how aware he is of exactly what is happening.

Our solicitor instructed a specialist to value the business from what information they could get their hands on and we got a valuation of 1.3 million (give or take).

However with just a week and a half to go before we need to submit the valuation, the accountant sent a very blunt email and has overall valued the business and subsidiaries at something like 50k with absolutely no paperwork or anything to back this up ..So hugely different to the independent valuation.

He also stated one arm of the company is non trading - it is and has always been active in companies house. Another he said is dormant - again very much still active in companies house. The company employs quite a few staff and it is very much still a going concern, we know this.

We feel he is being dishonest and his valuation sounds quite unrealistic - particularly as he has simply written this is a few sentences of an email with nothing at all to back it up.

So I guess my question is - if we submit IHT forms and have to go with what we have been given by the actual company accountant then we either aren't liable for IHT on this OR if we are (not sure if this amount is grouped with all other assets which exceed 500k? I do know but cannot remember right now!) it will be so little. But then after a full investigation (we feel unfortunately we may have to go way further with this) if the business does turn out to be worth 1 million plus , will we be able to present such a huge difference to IHT - will it look suspicious or even be allowed? If it was 20k I'm sure it would be fine but it's the difference potentially of over 1 million!

Will IHT potentially allow us to adjust this is such a huge way at some point in hopefully not too distant future?

Our solicitor is planning to add a note to explain the situation and say we don't think this is accurate but is this enough?

If anybody knows the answer to this it would be ever so helpful!

Equally if anyone has anything to add with regards to potentially very dishonest accountants and co owners in this situation and how we might go about this - that would be much appreciated!

Thank you

[AnthonyR]

You've got two conflicting valuations with very different figures here so someone must be wrong. However, business valuation is an art, not a science, so there is a lot of room for interpretation. Generally valuations are based on a multiple of profits combined with the net assets on the balance sheet. A £20m turnover doesn't necessarily mean that the company is profitable and if there are expenses of £25m the company may not be worth much at all.

One element to consider is that if it is a trading company it *may* be exempt from IHT due to Business Property Relief (BPR), regardless of whether it is worth £50k or £1m.

The other matter to consider is if the accountant has been looking after the company for many years he may know and understand the business and it's structure far better than the independent valuer who may have just based their calculations on the past few years accounts (which may not be reflective of the true value) and there's not much advantage to the accountant in providing a valuation that is so inaccurate that it would amount to fraud (although obviously it's possible).

Does the accountant understand the IHT consequences of the valuation? I assume the solicitor has reviewed the position with respect to the trading/non trading nature of the company and has considered if it qualifies for BPR? If he is confident that it does qualify for BPR then the only issue with accepting the higher valuation may impact on the ability to claim the additional Residence Nil Rate Band.

[pawncob]

As AR says, if BPR is available the valuation doesn't matter, EXCEPT that a very high value may be beneficial in terms of CGT further down the line, as this could be the base cost for beneficiaries.