Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988

748 Limitations on direction-making power

(1) No direction may be given under section 747(1) with respect to an accounting period of a controlled foreign company if—

(a) in respect of that period the company pursues, within the meaning of Part 1 of Schedule 25, an acceptable distribution policy; or

(b) throughout that period the company is, within the meaning of Part II of that Schedule, engaged in exempt activities; or

(c) the public quotation condition set out in Part III of that Schedule is fulfilled with respect to that period; or

(d) the chargeable profits of the accounting period do not exceed £20,000 or, if the accounting period is less than 12 months, a proportionately reduced amount.

(2) Without prejudice to any right of appeal, nothing in subsection (1) above prevents the Board from giving a direction with respect to an accounting period after the end of that period but before it is known whether the company has paid such a dividend as establishes that it is pursuing an acceptable distribution policy in respect of the profits arising in that period.

(3) Notwithstanding that none of paragraphs (a) to (d) of subsection (1) above applies to an accounting period of a controlled foreign company, no direction may be given under section 747(1) with respect to that accounting period if it appears to the Board that—

(a) in so far as any of the transactions the results of which are reflected in the profits arising in that accounting period, or any two or more of those transactions taken together, achieved a reduction in United Kingdom tax, either the reduction so achieved was minimal or it was not the main purpose or one of the main purposes of that transaction or, as the case may be, of those transactions taken together to achieve that reduction, and

(b) it was not the main reason or, as the case may be, one of the main reasons for the company’s existence in that accounting period to achieve a reduction in United Kingdom tax by a diversion of profits from the United Kingdom,

and Part IV of Schedule 25 shall have effect with respect to the preceding provisions of this subsection.