BIW was the subject of adverse media coverage in ‘Building’ magazine and ‘Contract Journal’ in September 2004 after comments in BIW’s 2003 accounts by its auditor relating to some £400,000 worth of tax credit claims. At the time, BIW chief executive Colin Smith wrote to the editors of both publications protesting at their “sensationalist and misleading” coverage and arguing that BIW had a very good prospect of successfully concluding the enquiry.
“Our stance has now been vindicated”, says Smith. “The Inland Revenue’s enquiry arose due to uncertainties over the interpretation of complex tax regulations. After further correspondence and meetings, the Inland Revenue tax inspector has conceded, as we expected, that the great majority of our original claims were valid.”
Smith has now written to the editors of both publications:
‘Dear Sir
‘Last year, you published a potentially misleading article concerning my company …, and a subsequent letter from me …, relating to BIW Technologies’ claims for some £400,000 worth of research and development tax credits.
‘We always believed that BIW would successfully conclude the enquiry by the Inland Revenue, and our position has now been vindicated.
‘The Inland Revenue has conceded that our claims were valid. There is now absolutely no question of BIW having to repay that £400,000.
‘Given the alarm and uncertainty that was caused among our 44,000-plus user community by your original article, I would be grateful if you could publish this letter to finally close this episode.
‘Yours faithfully, etc.’
Following clarification of the relevant tax guidelines, BIW will not pursue a small element of its original claims, relating to some ‘consumables’ and sub-contractor costs, but the conclusion of the Inland Revenue’s enquiry means that the core elements of BIW’s claims have now been allowed, and later BIW claims for R&D tax credits can also now be processed.
“In our view, there was never any uncertainty on this issue,” says Smith. “We believe BIW was the victim of negative and misleading briefings given to journalists by one of our competitors. Despite such underhand tactics, BIW has continued to win new customers and new projects – we have a forward order book of over £6.6 million, up by more than 22 per cent since last September.”
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Notes to editors:
- Project collaboration services from BIW Technologies (www.biwtech.com) were first employed in 1999 on UK construction projects for Sainsbury’s. BIW believes it is the European leader in web-based collaboration systems for the construction and property industry, measured by numbers of users, usage and volume of data.
- BIW Information Channel is a sophisticated web-based supply chain integration technology, designed specifically for construction projects or programmes. Each client is provided with a unique, project or programme-specific website created around a knowledge database. With this, data can be made available securely to every team member – from the earliest concepts, through detailed design, buildability studies, pre-fabrication, construction, maintenance, operation and improvement to the eventual demolition or dismantling of the facility.
- At 31 May 2005, the total number of BIW Information Channel users had reached 44,479, from 4771 different companies. Collectively, these users had logged in over seven million times, to work on around 2800 projects with a total capital value estimated at around £18 billion.
- BIW customers include United Utilities, Sainsbury’s, BAA, housebuilders Crest Nicholson and the Peabody Trust, Marks & Spencer, the Ministry of Defence, the Wellcome Trust, O2, Mace, Bovis Lend Lease, Kajima, Gleeds and developers Land Securities, Ballymore and Garbe.
- BIW and BIW Information Channel are registered trademarks or trademarks of BIW Technologies Ltd.
