There are straight forward “low hanging fruit” R&D work that can be identified and analyzed by consultants, this includes reviewing your company’s project lists, due diligence, conducting interviews with individuals, gathering information and documentation, formulating technical narratives and drafting the technical reports. In addition, the consultant prepares and/or reviews the company’s expenditure to ensure that the allocation of costs represent the eligible technical activities (Science Test), this is in parallel with assisting and defending the R&D claims in case of a review by HMRC. These factors alone may already be a good reason to consider selecting an R&D Tax Credit service provider, however there are even more reasons.
Below we have provided a Food & Beverage example on how a technical consultant’s involvement improves the R&D Tax Credit claim preparation process and result in a significant claim increase. We refer to these as “high hanging fruit” as it takes an industry expert in the field of science and technology and in R&D to identify and determine such “high hanging fruit”.
Example | Food & Beverage Industry
Developing a product with new ingredients and evaluating the quality using organoleptic testing may be part of qualifying R&D work. However, measuring the physical parameters with specific instruments to learn about the physical relationship between the ingredients and product’s properties makes the project much stronger from the technical perspective and undoubtedly eligible.
During a facility tour, a new instrument was identified by one of our consultants that the company intended to use for Quality Control (QC) purposes. When further discussions were carried out and the right questions were asked by the consultant in relation to the instrument, it was found that the instrument was used also for the R&D analysis and hence a portion of its cost could be included in the R&D Tax Credit Claim. Subsequently as a result of this finding a portion of the operators’ time spent on the instrument were eligible for the tax credit, as the operators were carrying out the testing, analysis and research activities. Most importantly, the most eligible activity was detected and added to the claim, this could have been easily overlooked in absence of a facility tour by an expert. Without recognising the R&D work involving the new instrument the project may have not been eligible at all. Over £20,000 were added to the claim.
Braithwaite’s technical consultants assist companies with efficient identification and preparation of their R&D work, as well as developing processes for proper tracking of information. However, having mentioned this, identifying and determining R&D work for claim submission involves the experience of a trained professional who is an expert in each relevant industry. Trust the R&D experts at Braithwaite UK with your next R&D Tax Credit Claim by contacting us today.
Roy Charlton
Braithwaite Innovation Funding
Innovation House, 39, Mark Road, Hemel Hempstead, Herts. HP2 7DN
E: rcharlton@btrcl.co.uk
T: +44 (0)203 633 6819
M: +44 (0)797 953 2002