Sam Stephens
Director
It’s that time of year again – HMRC have released their yearly R&D Tax Credit report, detailing the breakdown of the most recent years claims!
Over £35 billion has been spent by businesses all over the UK and identified as being eligible R&D expenditure for claiming R&D Tax Credits. This has resulted in over £5.3 million being paid out to the 57,335 businesses that have made a R&D Tax claim for financial year 2018-19; with the total value estimated to rise to £6.3 billion once all claims have been processed.
Let’s look at a breakdown of both the SME Scheme and RDEC Scheme statistics, looking at how many claims have been made, how much has been claimed and by which industry sectors!
59,265 claims have been made for Financial Year 2018-19 so far; 52,160 of those were made by SME’s into the SME Scheme, 3,310 were made by large companies into the RDEC Scheme, with an additional 3,790 SME claims made a via the RDEC Scheme.
The total amount of claims is due to rise as more claims are made during the 2-year retrospective claim period. In previous years, the number of claims has increased by 17%-20%, meaning the total claims for financial year 2018-19 could be around 70,000!
The £5.3 billion of R&D Tax benefit received is split between the same 3 categories:
Within the current statistics, the average claim for a SME Scheme claim is £57,000 – reflecting a similar average from the previous year.
Large enterprises claiming RDEC benefited £632,000 on average, while SME’s claiming under the RDEC scheme received £68,000.
The statistics show that there are 3 industry sectors that have made 67% of the R&D Tax Credit claims for 2018-19:
By claim value, these 3 industries have also claimed a huge 71% of the £5.3 billion tax relief.
Following the top 3, the next 4 largest claimant sectors are:
We’re thrilled to see that so many UK businesses, across a variety of sectors, are recognising the benefit of claiming R&D Tax Credits for the R&D they’ve performed and making the most of both schemes available.
We’re especially excited about the news that 10,200 of the businesses that have claimed for 2018-19 are new claimants, that’s 17.8% of all businesses that claimed!
As with previous years, the number of new claimants is expected to grow as more claims are made. It’s anticipated that the total will reflect the growth from previous years.
With an increasing number of businesses claiming R&D Tax Relief, year-on-year, which is expected to continue, now is the perfect time to check whether your company is also eligible to make a claim.
You can check how much your claim could be worth, by using our online R&D Tax Credit Calculator!
Alternatively, you can get in touch with us here, or using the form below.
Explore TBAT Innovation's latest insights on HMRC’s R&D statistics, highlighting key trends in R&D tax relief claims, compliance, and the measures introduced to reduce error and fraud. Learn how TBAT’s expertise supports businesses in navigating these changes and ensuring their R&D claims are compliant.
Like many R&D tax credit professionals and accountants, TBAT have conducted a number of compliance checks, supporting both our own claims and those of clients who sought assistance with claims prepared by others. In our latest article, we take you through how TBAT Innovation is managing these compliance checks.
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