Perth Red
Post Whore
- Messages
- 68,360
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/apr/01/super-league-inland-revenue-offshore-payments
Large bills and fewer overseas players as tax loophole is closed
Super League clubs, already facing tough times, have been hit by a fresh financial worry as the Inland Revenue clamps down on the tax loophole under which leading players have been paid a large proportion of their salaries in image rights.
The offshore payments, which date back to 2005 and have mainly gone to overseas players who collect them on their way home, leading them to be dubbed "flying over Singapore payments" in Australia have held significant tax advantages for the players and effectively exempted clubs from paying National Insurance on anything up to 40% of some salaries. But now clubs are braced for a major change in those arrangements which will seriously reduce their ability to attract leading Australian players and there are suggestions that they may be forced to make retrospective payments which in a couple of cases could run well into six figures.