HMRC has announced that personal representatives will, in future, be able to assume that their IHT400 inheritance tax estate returns will not require a compliance check or a check of valuation of assets if 12 weeks has passed from when the IHT421 calculation has been issued.

This certainty for executors can only be seen as good news as estate administrators have often found that HMRC takes too long to process IHT400s, and the general consensus is that it would be useful to know as early as possible whether a compliance check will be required, or whether the IHT400's valuation of the assets will be examined.