Background

Creative Industry Tax Reliefs

What are these?

Creative Industry Tax Reliefs are a group of Corporation Tax reliefs available for companies in the creative sector. For commercial production companies, the relief allows enhanced expenditure on certain eligible costs and therefore lower taxable profit, and a lower tax bill.

For non-commercial producers including charitable companies (or SCIOs) this can produce a loss which can be surrendered for a cash repayment from HMRC. See the table below for the total amount of relief up to 2018/19 (source).

Can I make a claim?

When we discuss the possibility of a claim with our creative industry clients – many of whom are registered as charities – we usually discuss a couple of key misconceptions:

  • We didn’t pay any tax last year – how can we claim it back if we didn’t pay anything?
  • We’re a charity, we don’t submit a corporation tax return

The truth is that these reliefs are available to all entities which are within the scope of corporation tax – this means any company or corporate body including Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisations (SCIO) can make a claim – whether or not they’ve paid any corporation tax (or even submitted a return).

What next?

We can help register you for corporation tax, work out which productions qualify and the eligible costs, then submit the tax return along with HMRC’s preferred format prescribed by their Creative Industries Unit.

Once the claim is successful you will receive a repayment to your bank account! Get in touch with David or call the office on 0141 334 1318 to see if your organisation can make a claim. 

Tax ReliefAmount Claimed to 2018/19
Film Tax Relief£3.3bn
High End TV £821m
Animation£61m
Video Games£324m
Children's TV£34m
Theatre£208m
Orchestra£23m
Museums & Galleries£4m
Total£4.78bn