A father and daughter who ran a Chelsea tailors have been sentenced after pocketing around £700,000 that should have been paid in tax, following an HMRC investigation
Tosca Tossoun, and his daughter Tanya Halil, both of Wandsworth, ran Tosca & Daughters tailors on Chelsea’s Lower Sloane Street. Over three years, they charged their customers £294,925 VAT, but did not pay it across to HMRC. Nor did they pay corporation tax or PAYE or file any self assessment returns resulting in them evading more than £400,000 in income tax.
HMRC investigators found the money was used to fund Tossoun’s and Halil’s lifestyles. This included paying rents on their homes of around £4,000 a month and private school fees of £30,000 a year. Analysis of their financial records revealed regular sums totalling almost £350,000 was transferred into Halil’s bank account from the business over three years.
Tossoun admitted fraud while Halil was convicted after a trial at Woolwich Crown Court. Tossoun was sentenced to two years three months in prison and ordered to pay costs of £1,000, while Halil was sentenced to two years in prison suspended for two years and must also complete 120 hours of unpaid work and pay costs of £5,000.
Confiscation proceedings to recover any financial gain Halil and Tossoun made are underway.
