This is down again from the 152 fines that were issued in 2019, and the 125 issued fines in 2018, shows figures from Pinsent Masons, the international law firm.

HMRC has been taking a more selective approach to fining finance directors as HMRC is now considering waiving a fine for a technical breach of the tax accounting rules if the tax authority is comfortable that ‘no actual tax is owed’.

Pinsent Masons says that much of the fall in the number of fines against finance directors is due to HMRC having to shift the focus of their investigations away from tax disputes with big businesses to investigating furlough fraud.