Enter Your E-mail

James Bailey reveals how a tax case could potentially enable some partners to enjoy a substantial National Insurance refund.

Class 2 NIC & Class 4 NIC for the Self-Employed

Class 2 National Insurance Contributions (NICs) are a fixed weekly amount (currently £2.40p per week) and Class 4 NIC is based on a percentage of your share of the partnership profits. The current rate is 8% of the profits between £5,715 and £43,875 (a maximum of £3,053) and 1% on any profits above £43,875.

Class 4 NIC is charged on the profits “immediately derived from the carrying on or exercise of one or more trades, professions or vocations”.

Sleeping Partners and National Insurance

A “sleeping partner” is a partner who does not take any part in the running of the partnership’s business. HMRC accept that such a partner is not liable to Class 4 NIC, because they do not fall within the definition above.

In the past, there has been a reluctance to classify a partner as a “sleeping partner”, particularly in the case of the standard husband and wife partnership. This was because there was a fear that HMRC would argue that the sleeping partner was not really entitled to their profit share, and that as a result the active partner had made a “settlement” on the sleeping partner by consenting to their having a share of profits they had not “earned”.

The fear was that HMRC would therefore seek to tax the active partner on the profits diverted to the sleeping partner – often with the result that those profits would be liable to income tax at 40% instead of the 20% they suffered in the hands of the sleeping partner.

“Arctic Systems” Case

In 2007 however, a tax case known as the “Arctic Systems” case went to the House of Lords, and the taxpayer won. In that case, a husband and wife had set up a limited company which received Mr Jones’ (the husband's) earnings as a software engineer, and paid them out in dividends to Mr Jones and to his wife.

HMRC tried to argue that because Mr Jones had effectively given his wife the opportunity to enjoy the dividends from the company, he should pay tax (at 40%) on all of them. HMRC lost, and in their judgement, the Lords made it clear that the same argument would apply to a sleeping partner – each partner was taxable on their share of the profits, and HMRC could not tax the active partner on the profits of the sleeping partner.

This means that in a case where one of the partners does not actually get involved in running the business, that partner is not liable to Class 4 NIC. If they have in fact been paying their £3,000-plus of Class 4 NIC per year, they can make a claim for “error or mistake” relief to get it back.

Practical Tip - Claim your National Insurance Refund

If you believe you have a case for reclaiming your class 4 NIC, you should first discuss the implications with a tax adviser, as the situation may not be quite as simple as this article suggests, but in many cases, there may be a useful windfall from a claim for repayment of around £10,000.