Philosophy does not appear very often in the world of Employee Benefits, or indeed on this blog.
Yet a genuine philosophical question lies just over the horizon, and this question may well influence many healthcare related benefits, and indeed employers attitudes to handling sickness absence. The question:
When does an announced tax-incentive not exist?
To explain:
Followers of this blog will recall that in March this year George Osborne announced a new tax-break for recommended medical interventions to help return ill employees back to the workplace quickly. This tax-incentive is due to kick-in from the 6th April 2014.
The Consultation document from HMRC in August suggested that the tax-incentive was intended to only apply to medical interventions recommended by another new service, The Independent Assessment Service (IAS). Quite why the Government believe that the IAS will be the only suitable service to recommend medical interventions is a matter of some debate (and something that I really hope will be overturned in the final analysis).
But to return to my theme, it seems possible that the tax-incentive may be reliant on the IAS recommendation. And the IAS (which was targeted to commence by October 2014) still appears to be a work in progress.
So it’s quite likely that we may end up with a tax-incentive available from the 6th April next year, which can only be accessed via a (as yet) non-existent state funded IAS service.
So a genuine conundrum for the industry and employers to play with, and one that I really hope the various Government departments will aim to unravel rather quickly now.
And in the meantime, this does at least demonstrate that sometimes philosophy turns up even in the strange world of employee benefits.
Best regards
Steve
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