Major retailer must repay €8.87m in Covid subsidy wage payments

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mathepac

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Un-named retailer must repay €8.87m of Covid subsidy payments

"A major retailer must repay €8.87 million to the Revenue Commissioners after wrongly claiming that amount during the Covid-19 pandemic in wage subsidy payments for its staff.

After hearing evidence and submissions over eight days across 2025 and this year at the Tax Appeals Commission (TAC), Commissioner Simon Noone has found that Revenue was correct in raising the €8.87m Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) assessment on the un-named retailer in 2024."

Revenue wants the money back, but why is the business un-named? If I owed Revenue a fraction of that €8.87M my name, address and other identifying details would be up there in bold capitals. Why the secrecy?
 
mathepac said:
Revenue wants the money back, but why is the business un-named? If I owed Revenue a fraction of that €8.87M my name, address and other identifying details would be up there in bold capitals. Why the secrecy?
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Probably because they claimed they have a valid argument that they did not have a liability and until the TAC ruling, they could claim it was not due. Revenue will likely give them a period of time to pay as a current tax debt rather than an overdue debt.

My guess is you had a valid argument for a tax refund that revenue subsequently decided you were not due, and you appealed the decision, you would not be named until a reasonable time to pay after a decision was handed down by the TAC.

Not difficult to guess who the retailer likely is :D
 
If I disagree with the Revenue's ruling on my tax affairs, why should the challenge be made public and my financial affairs made public?

If that were the case, I might well be discouraged from challenging a ruling I disagreed with.

So Revenue is right in not identifying those who challenge their rulings.
 
"Mr Noone [TAC] found as a fact that the retailer did not have separate business divisions but was a unified retail organisation.

Mr Noone said that he was satisfied that the retailer has not demonstrated that it had individual business divisions with clearly distinct management structures, as required by the guidelines.

A note at the end of the 55-page ruling states that the TAC has been requested to state and sign a case for the opinion of the High Court."

The last sentence in the news report is the one in bold above. Does this mean the decision optionally goes to court for re-appeal as it has already been appealed with Revenue via TAC? Presumably the loser in the High Court case pays all costs and the case, once listed, identifies all parties.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
If I disagree with the Revenue's ruling on my tax affairs, why should the challenge be made public and my financial affairs made public?

If that were the case, I might well be discouraged from challenging a ruling I disagreed with.
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That issue is discussed here.

Taxpayers who appeal Revenue decisions to be named

I wasn't aware of this. https://www.irishtimes.com/your-money/2025/12/24/tax-professionals-criticise-chilling-proposal-to-name-taxpayers-who-appeal-revenue-bills/ If there were some way of identifying vexatious or frivolous appeals, then maybe identify them after their appeal is dismissed...
www.askaboutmoney.com
 
Brendan Burgess said:
If I disagree with the Revenue's ruling on my tax affairs, why should the challenge be made public and my financial affairs made public?
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But this is not a tax matter, it's a welfare/hardship payment available to employers under certain strict conditions as they applied during COVID. I'm guessing here but Revenue got the job of monitoring and administering these payments to employers because they have the data about companies, whereas Social Welfare would have data about individuals. Because its not a tax matter, I didn't post it in the tax forum.

BTW, personally speaking, I have no problem with outing tax defaulters, tax cheats, or welfare cheats. We've all made our contributions to those pots of money in our time, thank you to those who try to ensure they're used properly.
 
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