How R&D tax relief could revolutionise your business

How R&D tax relief could revolutionise your business

Many UK business owners wrongly believe that Research & Development Tax Credit (R&D) is only available to companies in certain sectors. 

That is why Haines Watts is on a mission to ensure UK companies are maximising tax relief opportunities by educating entrepreneurs and their key technical staff.

What is Research & Development (R&D) tax relief?

Research & Development (R&D) tax relief is a government incentive available to UK companies to encourage investment in innovation. Companies can claim against the cost of any qualifying research and development expenditure, lowering their taxable profits and reducing their corporation tax bill. This can improve their cash flow and enable them to further invest in their operations.

Who can claim R&D tax relief?

The beauty is that R&D tax relief is open to a huge range of industry sectors (unlike other tax reliefs there is no notion of excluded trades). We can assist you with the burden of proof in demonstrating efforts to exceed technological baselines (or create new ones – we love a paradigm shift) in pursuit of improvements to products, services or processes, increased efficiency, advancing technology or bringing new products to market.

Manufacturing and engineering are in a particularly strong position to benefit from R&D. However, we make claims for a wide variety of industries. The Haines Watts’ R&D North West team has worked with a diverse range of clients – 55 sectors/sub-sectors in the last quarter alone.  

R&D manufacturing example

If you’re a manufacturer or engineer introducing new or improved products or manufacturing processes. For example, if you are designing/modifying equipment, building and testing prototypes, introducing a new IT infrastructure, computer-aided design tools (software as a tool in production methodologies) or streamlining manufacturing processes through automation – then you may qualify to make a claim. Or perhaps you have been developing new ways to optimise production line processes or are adapting an existing product for a new overseas market.

These efforts don’t even need to have been successful! You can actually claim for failed attempts to improve products or processes. Whatever you have been doing, it is worth having a conversation with an R&D tax specialist to see if you’re eligible to claim.

Retrospective R&D claims

The good news is R&D claims can be made retrospectively You can file a retrospective claim for any R&D activity carried out in the last two years. With the average claims for SME companies at £57,330 (HMRC September 2021 stats) per year. This could make a real difference to your business, enabling you to re-invest, maximise growth and realise your long-term business development plan sooner than you think.

We would love to assist you to make that Holy Grail project a reality.

Contact us today at our offices in Liverpool, Wirral and Chester to find out more or have a chat about whether your project may be eligible for R&D tax relief.