Costs of access

We will usually provide you with an opportunity to discuss the scope of our access visit, the timeframes and any difficulties likely to be encountered. We will consider ways of reducing your costs of providing reasonable facilities and assistance to us – for example, we may ask to use a photocopier when it is not being operated by your staff, or may supply our own paper to make copies.

We may seek access to documents or information for a category of persons (rather than an individual taxpayer) if we are likely to obtain a result from these enquiries. Before making a request about large numbers of taxpayers, we may take samples of your information to determine if obtaining bulk data will be effective.

When seeking access, we are not liable for any fee or charge and will not agree to pay any such fee or charge as a condition of using our access powers. We will consider who should bear the costs incurred in producing the information we request, although in most cases this will be you. You may be able to claim a tax deduction for costs incurred in complying with our access request.