Revenue sends 142 letters to influencers warning them about tax obligations on gifts and free goods

Revenue has said it is “educating” young influencers on tax by sending out letters warning about their obligations.

The tax authority issued 142 letters to influencers last year under a “Level 1 Compliance Intervention” – an early warning that income, gifts, free goods and services, virtual currency or token payments needed to be properly accounted for.

Fianna Fáil TD Paul McAuliffe asked chairman of the Revenue Commissioners Niall Cody at the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday how physical gifts sent to influencers and free hotel breaks would be treated by Revenue Commissioners.

“It’s a new industry but the exact rules apply to them as they apply to anybody else,” said Mr Cody.

“If you’re getting an income in money or in-kind, [they are] liable to the self-assessment system.”

He said Revenue had been notified by companies paying influencers, which would have prompted the letters, but he said some of the influencers were “very young” and not familiar with the tax system.

“They get money from somebody, so what we would have got is data from the parent entity. Some of the people are actually very young and have ­probably no real understanding of the thing, so what we’re trying to do is trying to educate people and get them into the system. Our main interest is trying to get people to comply.”

He said there were “complex rules” around sponsorships and influencers being given a complimentary hotel room and meal to post a review of it online.

“There’s issues around brand sponsorship and cars being given to inter-county managers or whatever and some of that is not taxable because there is nothing given in return, but some of it is,” said Mr Cody.

The meeting was also told how in the wake of Brexit the work undertaken by Customs had “exploded” at ports and airports. Mr Cody said there was a “fairly significant” recruitment drive since Brexit after a business case was made to the Department of Public Expenditure for extra staff.

Cocaine was the headline seizure of last year as a result of the MV Matthew, which had around €150m worth of the drug on board.

He said there had been a “fairly significant” number of seizures in Rosslare, Co Wexford, where 36 ferries dock each week.

There used to be six during the week in the wintertime and 10 during the week in summer before Brexit.

“Our customs work has just exploded,” Mr Cody added.

The last time he appeared before TDs, there was €44m worth of imports coming in, whereas there was only €1m before Brexit.

Since then, this number had shot up to €79m import entries, he told Fine Gael TD Alan Dillon.

“In that legitimate return entries, there is hidden contraband, counterfeit, drugs, cigarettes,” he said.

Before Brexit, Rosslare had 18 “allowance posts”, where staff work round the clock. This has shot up to 80.

On local property tax, he said Revenue officials were having difficulty in identifying property owners when chasing unpaid local property tax. Sometimes property owners were living abroad and could be hard to track down.

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