Companies will be hit with the burden of more red tape as HM Revenue & Customs intend to clamp down on tax evasion by clients and their customers, tax experts have warned. HMRC plans to impose large fines of up to £300 on businesses that fail to deliver information requested by HMRC about clients, as well as a hefty daily penalty of £60 for each day a fine payment is late. According to UHY Hacker Young, the scheme is expected to result in companies investing large sums of money to keep up with the demands of the department, adding more pressure to them at a time when support is needed to weather the current economic climate. Roy Maugham, tax partner at UHY Hacker Young, said: 'These measures are going to place an expensive red-tape burden on organisations at a time when businesses are desperately looking to control costs.' He added: 'To comply with the new HMRC demands businesses may have to invest in expensive data storage and protection technology.' And companies shouldn't expect that they will be helped with the cost for implementing the measure. Maugham said it is 'unfair' for businesses to be hindered by extra expenditure that 'should belong to government compliance with money laundering regulations already costs[ing] UK plc hundreds of millions of pounds every year.' Currently, only banks and estate agents are requested to pass on details of taxpayers to HMRC but last week's court victory for the department - 300 financial institutions were forced to identify customers with offshore accounts - highlights the seriousness of HMRC's proposals to tackle tax evasion. 'With these extended powers HMRC will be able to build a database of unprecedented size and power about UK citizens and businesses. This means that it will be able to crosscheck the bank details of potentially everyone against their tax returns in just a few clicks' Maugham said. Maugham is warning taxpayers that this is not the last we are to see of HMRC's tax checking schemes. He said: 'With the soaring public debt, HMRC will be very keen to boost tax revenue, so we could see much more of these targeted compliance campaigns line up in the near future.'