ILR window case worker requires tax rtn 2010

[kareem152]

My friend got his hsmp extention in 2010 and last week applied for ILR at Liverpool on window. The caseworker required him to provide tax return for 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 within 10 days by post.

At extention time, he got his income points with a mix of PAYE and self-employment. After getting
His extention in 2010, he lowered down his self employment income to save the tax. Now he fears if he sends that lowered tax return of 2010, he may reject his ILR. Please suggest some solution. Thanks

[snowball001]

That's interesting yet not surprising. They are basically suspecting your friend made up this self-employed income to score enough points together with the (genuine) employed income, and as a result, was less willing to pay tax based on non-existing income.

Sending required tax return docs can be straightforward but the outcome could depend on how much he lowered the self-employed income in the years following the extension in 2010 and the tax he paid in 09/10 - does it reasonably correspond to the income he claimed in 2010? How much income he needed in 2010 and how much he claimed?

They can't reject his application only because his income went lower but they might tend to think it more necessary to require further documents to prove his self-employed activity really existed, if the tax return shows that the income went significantly lower when tax was concerned.

[kareem152]

Yes you are right they might be suspecting the self-employed income. He needed 32k, out of which he claimed 12k from self employment at extention, though it was genuine. But tried to save tax and lowered down 12k to 5k for the tax purpose in 2009-2010 tax return. The income for 2010-2011 is around 21k on PAYE hence no self employment income in 2010-2011. What he should do now:

1. Submit the same tax return with lowered income. Can they object that at extention time your income was not 32K to meet the points and ILR is rejected.
2. Re-write the tax return 2009-2010 now and send it to hmrc with a cover letter that there were errors so its the corrected one now. Send this one copy to UKBA....but again UKBA can investigate 2009 income and its genuine and all the evidences can be verified.