ARTG8320 - First-tier and Upper Tribunals: preparing for tribunal: role of the Clearing House

The Clearing House is the single HMRC contact point with the Tribunals Service for initial notification of tax appeals and applications.

The Clearing House receives notifications of appeals and applications from the Tribunals Service and identifies where in HMRC to send them, on the basis of information contained in the customer’s appeal and the relevant HMRC decision notice, which should always be attached to the appeal.

The Clearing House

• receives notification of the appeal from the Tribunals Service Central Processing Centre and records it, and
• sends the appeal and supporting documentation to the appropriate Appeals Unit (direct taxes) or Solicitor’s Office (indirect taxes)

If the business unit has more than one Appeals Unit the Clearing House will send the appeal to the Appeals Unit that has been nominated as the single point of contact for the Clearing House. If the business unit does not have an Appeals Unit, the Clearing House will send the appeal to the review team within the business unit.

The Appeals Unit or review team will then liaise with any relevant parties so that the correspondence is passed to the appropriate person, such as the decision maker or tribunal’s caseworker in the appropriate business unit.

The Clearing House will not enter into correspondence within HMRC about a case. If the appropriate Appeals Unit or review team cannot be identified, or the customer’s intentions are not clear, the Clearing House will refer the communication to the relevant business area to trace the decision maker or contact the customer, as appropriate

The Clearing House should be invisible to the customer unless, exceptionally, it needs to make contact with the customer to correct problems with the notification.