Leicestertinytiger wrote: ↑Fri Jan 24, 2020 9:37 am
Image right payments are normally paid to a players personal limited companies which are subject to corp tax and self-assessment on the divvies. Or they’ll declare the income on self assessment form.
Plus the loans would have nothing to do with HMRC as their definition of a salary differs to PRL. Therefore I doubt they’d be that interested in either.
The issue with image rights is when the salary is unusually low, and the image rights unusually high. HMRC can view this as evading tax - there is precedent.
E.g. if Maro Itoje was paid £200k last season and had 30% of his image rights bought for £2.4m by the man who owns his employer, it is pretty obvious that at least part of that image rights payment was disguised salary and should have been taxed as such.
Agreed, but there was massive discrepancy in the valuation of his image rights by two different auditors. PwC are a reputable firm so trying to prove their valuation was incorrect would be very difficult. Also given that they were paying 3k an hour for legal advice, good luck fighting that in court.
As Flash mentioned above, if Itoje's salary really was as low as has been implied, then I wouldn't bet against HMRC winning that one. The best second row in the country, one of the best in the world, not even in the top 10 2nd row earners in the league? But getting paid a fortune for his image rights? It's not just the large amount paid for image rights taken in isolation, you have to put it against the salary paid and look at the whole picture.
I know for a fact that PwC advised/warned Sarries a year ago that this might be seen as tax evasion, so using them as a defence isn't going to work.
There was a general understanding that HMRC had agreed that up to 20% of salary could be paid as image rights, although never confirmed officially, but even that is in doubt now. If Itoje earned more from image rights than salary last year, then I'm pretty sure he and Sarries have a problem there. There are a few complexities to it, not least that it seems as though Wray bought 30% of his image rights for his entire career rather than a payment just for that year, so that may not be viewed as income just for last season, but there are definitely questions to ask and I have little doubt that HMRC will ask them.
If my salary was that low (comparatively speaking!),and since I am an educated man, wouldn’t you think I might be a teeny bit suspicious if I was given some extra dosh to make it up to par?
I just wish my old boss had made up my salary by chipping in when I wanted to buy a house. Or that he might have helped me start up a business by providing seed funding.
Maybe I just worked for the wrong business, and he was just mean so underpaid me.
Remember! Sarries negotiated many of the contracts direct with the players. This irritated the agents, who apparently provided information about Sarries players. Harlequins provided a hefty folder full of information on their old enemies, which is what set the hare running.
Interesting letter in today‘s Times about the effect on other championship clubs of playing against Sarries, including possibility of bad injuries. Food for thought.
fleabane wrote: ↑Fri Jan 24, 2020 4:33 pm
If my salary was that low (comparatively speaking!),and since I am an educated man, wouldn’t you think I might be a teeny bit suspicious if I was given some extra dosh to make it up to par?
I just wish my old boss had made up my salary by chipping in when I wanted to buy a house. Or that he might have helped me start up a business by providing seed funding.
Maybe I just worked for the wrong business, and he was just mean so underpaid me.
Remember! Sarries negotiated many of the contracts direct with the players. This irritated the agents, who apparently provided information about Sarries players. Harlequins provided a hefty folder full of information on their old enemies, which is what set the hare running.
It would be interesting to know if there was anything in the file about the transfer of James 'Jamie' Johnston from Quins to Saracens. No doubt that was all above board.
Leicestertinytiger wrote: ↑Fri Jan 24, 2020 9:37 am
Image right payments are normally paid to a players personal limited companies which are subject to corp tax and self-assessment on the divvies. Or they’ll declare the income on self assessment form.
Plus the loans would have nothing to do with HMRC as their definition of a salary differs to PRL. Therefore I doubt they’d be that interested in either.
The issue with image rights is when the salary is unusually low, and the image rights unusually high. HMRC can view this as evading tax - there is precedent.
E.g. if Maro Itoje was paid £200k last season and had 30% of his image rights bought for £2.4m by the man who owns his employer, it is pretty obvious that at least part of that image rights payment was disguised salary and should have been taxed as such.
It seems as though the release of the report has not cleared the issue up.
I recall someone a few seasons back suggesting that Itoje was on a similar amount to other senior players, around the 450k mark.
No idea if this has changed since.
I thought I read that Sarries had paid 1.6m (not 2.4m) for a 30% share in his image rights as valued by a leading company and that was valued by another company for the report to be of only 800k value.
I dont know what Itoje is actually paid, I'm just giving a hypothetical example. It has been reported that there are at least 10 other locks in the league paid more than him, so he's definitely well below market rate.
Tiglon wrote: ↑Sat Jan 25, 2020 12:22 pm
I dont know what Itoje is actually paid, I'm just giving a hypothetical example. It has been reported that there are at least 10 other locks in the league paid more than him, so he's definitely well below market rate.
There has been an influx of quality locks around the league.
If Itoje signed a five year contract two or three years ago then it could be so.
I suppose the situation is quite fluid.
Tiglon wrote: ↑Sat Jan 25, 2020 12:22 pm
I dont know what Itoje is actually paid, I'm just giving a hypothetical example. It has been reported that there are at least 10 other locks in the league paid more than him, so he's definitely well below market rate.
There has been an influx of quality locks around the league.
If Itoje signed a five year contract two or three years ago then it could be so.
I suppose the situation is quite fluid.
Fair point, but he signed his new contract last season (january 2019).
Tiglon wrote: ↑Sat Jan 25, 2020 12:22 pm
I dont know what Itoje is actually paid, I'm just giving a hypothetical example. It has been reported that there are at least 10 other locks in the league paid more than him, so he's definitely well below market rate.
There has been an influx of quality locks around the league.
If Itoje signed a five year contract two or three years ago then it could be so.
I suppose the situation is quite fluid.
Fair point, but he signed his new contract last season (january 2019).
One year ago, so I suppose it's all relative to what others have had to pay to bring quality in to compete and how much Itoje might lower his demands in order to stay at Sarries and keep playing for England at the time of signing.
The England thing is a confusing issue here because England players are sometimes offsetting their club demands against the ability to earn 25k a game at international level.
Lock has been quite competitive between clubs for quality signings.
Mark62 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 25, 2020 1:10 pm
Various industry sources have told RugbyPass that they estimate Itoje’s new salary to be somewhere in the region of £750,00 to £1 million.
This is taken from the press almost exactly a year ago.
Make of it as you will
The Salary Cap Manager had access to the contract and to contracts for other players and still thought he was being underpaid compared to the going rate. I therefore doubt that the actual contracted salary was 750k-1m. Perhaps that figure included the image rights purchase...
nasher wrote: ↑Sun Jan 26, 2020 12:31 pm
Do you realise Nigel Wray has saved us from relegation. The Board and playing staff could not.
Yes, and at this moment i'm feeling embarrassed that we find ourselves in that position, I still believe we might get up to 10th and save our blushes.
For me 10th or 11th would slightly reduce our blushes. 8th or 9th would probably require good enough form for the rest of the season that we could go into 2020/21 with renewed confidence and completely blush free.