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This is the seventh of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
The challenge of balancing the freedom to set different tax rates and create incentives while avoiding both a 'race to the bottom' and the provision of opportunities for avoidance is not only an issue for international tax negotiations; it is at the heart of the debate around the devolution of taxes within the UK.
Beginning just two days after the Scottish independence referendum, issues around the devolution of powers within the UK caused a significant amount of awkwardness at Labour's conference. Labour are the least enthusiastic of the three main UK parties for tax devolution, their latest policy document recognising the risks of both competitive tax cutting between different jurisdictions, and that devolution of powers could make redistributive policies more difficult. In his leader's speech, Ed Miliband tried to push the 'English question' into the middle distance with a proposal for a constitutional convention. There were calls from all parts of the party for devolution to city and county regions within England.
Scottish Conservative leader, Ruth Davidson MSP, committed her party to the devolution of greater income tax raising powers north of the border as a key platform for the 2016 elections; the Scotland Act 2012 currently allows Holyrood to increase/decrease the income tax rate by 10%. Party representatives are currently engaging on devolution via the Smith Commission, which is due to publish proposals in November. The conference also saw David Cameron strengthen his commitment to legislating to prevent Scottish MPs from voting at Westminster on devolved issues (including any elements of the tax system devolved to the Scottish Parliament), stating: "This is my vow: English votes for English laws – the Conservatives will deliver it."
At Lib Dem conference in Glasgow Scottish Secretary Alastair Carmichael set out a vision of "a Scotland that raises the majority of its own revenues, that can borrow, tax and spend to meet Scotland's priorities, and have the freedom to innovate and reform as never before." He said that vision, as set out in the report of Ming Campbell's Commission, would be the party's contribution to the Smith Commission. Lib Dem policy, as set out in the Campbell Commission, is in favour of devolving not just further income tax powers but also inheritance tax and capital gains tax to Scotland, as well as assigning corporation tax receipts generated in Scotland.
The Scottish National Party's support for the Scottish Parliament having full control over tax and fiscal policy remains full-throated. This includes control over income tax, national insurance, corporation tax, capital gains tax, fuel duty, air passenger duty and inheritance tax. The SNP Government recently announced the rates for Scotland's new property tax, the Land and Buildings Transaction Tax, and faced criticism for substantially increasing the amount of tax payable by buyers of the most expensive properties, with some labelling it a Scottish 'mansion tax'.
At Conservative conference, Welsh Secretary Stephen Crabb announced a plan for more flexible income tax-varying powers for Cardiff. Under the previous plans, if the Welsh government wanted to cut the basic rate by 1p, all other rates of income tax would also have to be cut by 1p. Removing the much criticised "lockstep" system means that Wales could vary income tax rates without ensuring all income tax bands change by the same amount. The green light for the proposals will be dependent on a referendum. They appear in the Wales Bill, currently on its way through the UK Parliament, which will also devolve stamp duty land tax and landfill tax, with a target date of April 2018.
Plaid Cymru welcomed the announcement of additional powers. The party argues that Wales should have the same tax powers as Scotland. Immediately after the party conferences a perhaps surprisingly strong joint motion on devolution was agreed by the leaders of Labour, Conservatives, Plaid Cymru and Liberal Democrats in the Welsh Assembly. The parties agreed that a future Welsh Government should have the same powers as Scotland, including control of air passenger duty and corporation tax if that is devolved to Scotland and Northern Ireland. The leaders call for talks between the governments in Cardiff and Westminster to begin immediately and be concluded by the beginning of 2015, and for proposals to be published before the general election.
The UK Government is currently mulling over whether corporation tax (CT) powers should be devolved to Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa Villiers told a Conservative conference event that Stormont (the Northern Ireland Assembly) "needs to be in the best possible shape if it is to take on such a significant fiscal devolution." She said it was hard to see how the Northern Ireland Executive could fund a CT cut whilst there was an ongoing impasse over welfare reform. A decision is widely expected alongside the Autumn Statement. All of Northern Ireland's main business organisations and the Executive parties agree are supportive in principle of devolving the power though there is some trepidation about the initial loss of revenue. It was notable that both Conservative and Liberal Democrat ministers were keen during the conference season to mark out Northern Ireland as a special case with regards to CT devolution because of its land border with the Irish Republic. Northern Ireland may well get the right to set its own CT rate but this is unlikely to be extended to other parts of the UK.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsMonday 24 November 2014
This is the sixth of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
Quiz time. Which leading politician said this: "We have all read about large multinational companies that have chosen to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. For many years, a small minority have flitted between tax havens, paying little or nothing anywhere. A message to those global companies: We have cut your taxes – now you must pay what you owe."
It is a sign of the remarkable unity of purpose between the parties over the need to find ways to extract more tax from multinational corporations – especially those based around the internet – that it could be equally easily be a spokesman from any of the main parties. In fact it is a composite – the first sentence was Ed Balls, the second Danny Alexander and the third David Cameron.
A combination of huge media attention, intense political scrutiny (especially by the Public Accounts Committee) and the campaigning of groups such as Christian Aid has put the tax policies of multinationals at the top of the political agenda and – polls have shown – made them a concern to voters across the board, regardless of political affiliation. So it is unsurprising that, in cash-strapped times, all parties are straining to persuade voters of their determination to squeeze more revenue out of this source. The OECD's work on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) is still ongoing but it is clear the politicians are keen to be seen to be acting with due urgency, especially with an election on the horizon.
Consequently both parties of government had announcements to make of proposals that will appear in the Autumn Statement. Despite no explicit mention of the company, an announcement by George Osborne of a move to clamp down on multinational tax avoidance by, in particular, technology companies, has been widely christened the 'Google tax'. Government advisers briefed that they are attempting to crack down on a particular avoidance technique, the 'double Irish', where companies collect profits in jurisdictions with substantially lower tax rates than where the majority of their profits are made. The Government have indicated they will publish legislative proposals at the Autumn Statement which would force multinationals to pay UK taxes on UK profits. Asked why this had not been done sooner, The Guardian reports a 'source close to Osborne' as saying introducing changes earlier may have 'scared' companies away from the UK and the country could have lost them as big employers, but the tide of global public opinion had now changed.
The Liberal Democrats also had action to announce aimed at tackling perceived tax avoidance by multinationals. Danny Alexander said: "Our government has led the way in a global movement to rewrite the tax code. That work is nearing completion, and I can tell you Britain will be one of the first countries to put the new rules into action. This December, we will take the first steps with new rules to stop firms lending money across borders just to minimise tax." Alexander announced that the Government's action would stop hybrid mismatches: "This could yield hundreds of millions of pounds and it will put Britain in the lead with the first of many steps to implement the new global tax rules."
Transparency and tackling international avoidance remain central to Labour's tax policies. These were fleshed out a little in the party's business tax paper, published in June, and in the report presented to the conference by the party's Stability and Prosperity Policy Commission, co-chaired by Ed Balls. They include:• Prioritise increasing transparency in the Crown Dependencies and overseas territories, including requiring UK tax havens to reveal the identity of British tax evaders;• "Fundamental reform" of the international corporate tax system to develop a system which is robust and effective in the modern world, which supports investment and job creation, and deals effectively with the complexities of international business;• Consider how greater transparency around revenues, profits, and taxes paid could be delivered domestically if international agreement takes time to be reached;• Examine the international lessons on how we can improve transfer pricing rules, so that the way in which companies allocate their profits for tax purposes is fair.
Labour is also under pressure from party members and trades unions to go further in its support for a Financial Transactions Tax (FTT). Gail Cartmail of the union Unite told a fringe meeting that the FTT would be good for solidarity and would help end 'casino capitalism'. Shadow treasury minister Catherine McKinnell responded that Labour actively supports the tax but would not rush into it. She said the FTT was not a panacea and shouldn't be treated as such. The party's position remains that it would only introduce an FTT if it gains sufficient international support, including specifically a commitment from the United States to introduce it at the same time. Lib Dem policy is similarly supportive in principle but goes further in requiring the tax to be adopted by all the world's major financial centres. The Conservatives go further still, saying they would require the whole of the rest of the world to agree to introduce it at the same time.
The conference announcements were cautiously welcomed by campaigners. An ActionAid spokesman said that, if the 'Google Tax' was "broadly and robustly designed, it could be used to cut through the thickets of legal and accounting complexity which some big companies hide". ActionAid joined with Christian Aid and Oxfam to once again hold fringe events at all three conferences on the theme of corporate avoidance. Speakers highlighted the extent of the anger felt by the majority of the British public (84% of voters according to one poll). Losses to the UK Exchequer were substantial (a figure of £12 billion was quoted) but, unsurprisingly given the focus of the three bodies, the impact on developing countries was given even greater attention. The three charities trailed their forthcoming campaign for a 'Tax Dodging Bill' which they will be running between the autumn and next May's general election, seeking to persuade the political parties to bring in a range of measures including publication of country-by-country reporting of profits and taxes, and reform of UK corporate tax rules which they believe are overly generous to big business and in some cases harmful to poor countries. This issue is set to remain in the spotlight over the coming months.
While generally supportive of BEPS some commentators have sounded a note of caution over its potential to be a revenue-raiser for the British Government. At the CIOT's joint fringe debate with the IFS in Birmingham Patrick Stevens, the Institute's tax policy director, said that the UK could ultimately end up a net loser from the BEPS reforms. ITV News' Business Editor, Joel Hills, made a similar point, saying people should remember that "Britain has multinational companies too and ultimately the likes of GSK, BP and Vodafone – registered in Britain but with large global footprints - may end up paying rather less here."
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsWednesday 19 November 2014
The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee have returned to one of their favourite topics, tax compliance, in a report issued today, and widely covered in today's newspapers (see, for example, HMRC 'unacceptably slow' to tackle tax avoiders, say MPs (FT) and MPs' report on tax compliance finds HMRC to be slow to take action (Guardian)).
The report is a short one (only about nine pages of substance), and covers two areas – the reliability of HMRC's measures for tax compliance yield, and whether the tax authorities are doing enough to tackle tax avoidance.
On the first of these at least, the report is best seen as a follow-up of the National Audit Office's annual report on HMRC's accounts, published in July this year. This found that while HMRC were exceeding their targets for increasing compliance yield they were not doing so by as much as had been thought. This was because they had miscalculated their baseline for compliance yield during the current Parliament, resulting in the targets they were set being nearly £2 billion too low.
A quick explanation of what happened is this. The baseline figure was for the year 2010-11. At the time it was set – November 2010 – HMRC used a forecast for expected compliance yield over the year as final figures were not available. As HMRC was making significant changes to how it calculated compliance yield this forecast had a high degree of uncertainty about it. It turned out that the actual yield from disrupting organised crime that year (£2.52 billion) was three times the estimate (£0.84 billion). Added to other smaller deviations from the forecasts it meant the baseline compliance yield for 2010-11 (£14.7 billion) was £1.9 billion lower than the actual compliance yield (£16.6 billion) that year. This wouldn't have mattered if HMRC had updated the baseline when final figures for 2010-11 were available, but they didn't. As it turned out HMRC exceeded the targets set for them in the years following by enough that they actually met or exceeded the targets set for them, even taking into account the miscalculated baseline. For example in 2011-12 the target was to raise compliance yield by £2 billion. On HMRC's published figures they raised compliance yield by £3.9 billion. However given the baseline should have been £1.9 billion higher in reality they raised compliance yield by the required £2 billion – no more, no less.
HMRC, in their defence, can (and do) point out that even on the adjusted higher baseline (ie the real compliance yield for 20101-11) they have increased compliance yield by £7.3 billion or 44% in three years – no mean achievement, and significantly above the original target of a £5 billion increase set in 2010. However to an extent HMRC have been victims of their own apparent success, in that the Chancellor increased their target for 2013-14 by a further £3.3 billion in 2012 and 2013. Whether they have met this new target depends on whether it is best seen as a target total compliance yield of £23 billion, in which case it has been exceeded by £0.9 billion, or as a target increase from 2010-11 of £8.3 billion, in which case they have fallen short by £1 billion once the higher baseline has been factored in. Given the setting of the higher target was largely in response to HMRC's apparent success (in retrospect overstated) at exceeding earlier targets it is probably reasonable to see it as more the former.
Nevertheless the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) are, not unreasonably, concerned that a £1.9 billion error could have found its way into HMRC's figures and remained there undiscovered for a number of years. So when they called Lin Homer (chief executive) and other HMRC bosses before the PAC in July for their annual grilling over their accounts the baseline error was a key focus, and this is reflected in today's report, which demands improvements in the reliability of HMRC's compliance yield figures. Specifically the PAC asks for:• HMRC to ensure key performance indicators are robust and subject to internal and external (NAO) checks, before they are reported publicly• More transparency around HMRC's compliance yield figures, including making it clearer what is actually 'cash in the bank', as opposed to expected future revenue or anticipated losses that had been prevented• HMRC to keep a comparable measure of compliance yield over time
The other area covered by the PAC report is whether HMRC are making enough progress in tackling tax avoidance. Specifically the accusations being made by the Committee are that (a) HMRC is being too slow in taking action against avoidance schemes, and (b) HMRC is not doing enough to tackle companies which exploit international tax structures.
On the first of these they use the example of the Liberty scheme which began in 2005, was closed down in 2009 but has only this year been taken to a tax tribunal. The PAC acknowledge that accelerated payments could have a significant effect. They want HMRC to show it is using these and other powers "with sufficient urgency" and to report regularly on progress in this, for example in its annual report. The Committee has also highlighted that at least one promoter is currently pushing a scheme which claims to be outside both DOTAS and the GAAR "and results in an employee being in the position of receiving PAYE-free funds in his/her hands" (promoter's claim).
On international tax structures the PAC takes a sceptical view on the merits of a number of recent changes to UK tax rules, including the patent box and changes to the regime for controlled foreign companies, and has asked HMRC and the Treasury to "set out the actual costs and benefits" of these changes. The Committee also wants the Treasury and HMRC to provide them with "details of progress in identifying and addressing the ways that international tax structures and exploited".
As PAC reports go this one is not especially scathing, but it does illustrate that the Committee remains aggressively on HMRC's case.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsTuesday 18 November 2014
This is the fifth of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
Labour are still having to work hard to try to reassure multinationals and investors that they are not anti-big business. A year ago Labour announced new policy of an energy price freeze and measures to promote small business over big business. At the time Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls assured business leaders that this was not the start of a wider offensive. However initiatives since then attacking big banks, betting shops, payday lenders (who would face a levy, the proceeds of which would be used to build up their credit union rivals), and exploitative private sector landlords have led some to disagree. To quote the FT: "Mr Miliband insists he is pro-business but his prescriptions of energy price freezes, bank dismemberment, land seizures, rent controls and increases in the minimum wage have convinced many corporate leaders otherwise."
The bad news for businesses, especially those in the finance sector, continued to come during Labour's 2014 conference. While half of the funding for Labour's £2.5 billion fund for the NHS would come from a mansion tax the rest would be raised from levies on business: a new tax on tobacco firms' profits, action against "umbrella companies" used to employ temporary workers to avoid tax and NI, removing a stamp duty exemption currently available to hedge funds and closing the "quoted eurobond exemption" which allows some businesses to channel tax-free interest out of the UK. Previously announced policies to increase the bank levy, repeat the tax on bank bonuses and reintroduce stamp duty reserve tax were reaffirmed.
A year ago a key Labour announcement was that the party would reverse the cut in corporation tax from 21 per cent to 20 per cent due to take effect in April 2015, and use the money to cut business rates for 1.5 million small businesses. This was reaffirmed in Manchester. However in what might be seen as a move to reassure multinationals and investors on competitiveness, Ed Balls stated that the party would nonetheless keep Britain's corporation tax rates at the lowest in the G7. Other parts of Labour's offer to business include strengthening the British Investment Bank and warning of the risks of the Conservatives' flirting with exit from the European Union.
None of this, of course, prevents the Conservatives presenting Labour as anti-business, alongside parading their own tax-cutting credentials. "We have cut more in business taxes in this parliament than in any other parliament over the course of our history" was the triumphant message delivered to the CIOT/IFS conference fringe debate by David Gauke MP, Financial Secretary to the Treasury. As well as the cut in the headline rate of corporation tax he cited the introduction of the patent box and the employment allowance as measures particularly helping business. The final day of the Conservative conference saw David Cameron make a similar case, describing his Government's approach as "rolling out the red carpet" for inward investors and making the (potentially very brave, should others follow suit) commitment that, under the Conservatives, the UK "will always have the most competitive corporate taxes in the G20… lower than Germany, lower than Japan, lower than the United States".
Despite having the Business Secretary, the Lib Dems tend to be somewhat bashful about taking credit for business tax changes, preferring to focus on income tax cuts, investment in infrastructure and apprenticeships, and cracking down on avoidance. Vince Cable is also keen on drawing attention to the Government's sector-based industrial strategy, which gives the state a role in building business confidence, creating certainty around regulation, promoting competition, sponsoring research and protecting consumers, workers and the environment. In his keynote speech to the conference Cable described the Government's industrial strategy as "a public-private partnership, writ large."
Lib Dems share Labour's keenness to be seen to be backing small business over big. The party's pre-manifesto promises to "Continue to reform business tax to ensure it stays competitive, making small and medium-sized enterprises the priority for any business tax cuts". There is a pledge to review business rates in England, which are described as "a disproportionate burden on smaller businesses". The review will cover the option of moving to Site Value Rating within five years, and in the longer term Land Value Taxation more broadly. During the conference Vince Cable revealed that there is likely to be an announcement in the Autumn Statement that small companies looking to expand into improved premises will be given relief on their business rates.
In June Labour published a business tax policy document: 'Delivering Long-term Prosperity - Reform of Business Taxation'. The paper continues Labour's interest in how government can promote long-termism in investment; this was one of four principles in the June paper. The party believes that the growth of cutting-edge companies has been hampered by systemic pressures that force too many businesses to focus on the short term. In a speech in June Ed Balls said that Labour was examining the case for an Allowance for Corporate Equity (ACE), along the lines suggested in the Mirrlees Review, to redress the systemic bias in favour of debt finance. As well as looking at ACE the policy document advocates exploring structural tax changes to incentivise long-term investment (eg taper CGT on shares and income tax on dividends), as recommended by Sir George Cox in the report he produced for the party last year.
Other domestic business tax reforms set out in the June policy document are guided by the principles of support for enterprise and innovation, simplicity and predictability, and a commitment to fairness. Reforms being proposed include:• Support for tax simplification, and a considered and clearly signposted approach to tax reform, including considering establishing the Office of Tax Simplification as a truly independent body, outside the framework of the Treasury;• Drawing up a roadmap for capital allowances, which will assess the allowances available on plant and machinery in the UK against those offered by competitor countries and show what allowances will be available over the lifetime of the next Parliament and at what rates;• Looking into improved targeting of research and development tax credits (in particular, to maximise impact, rewarding "genuine contributions to national research capacity, rather than activities that are outsourced overseas");• Tackle dormant companies – Labour will require the annual confirmation of dormancy and explore the possibility of banks automatically informing HMRC when there is activity in supposedly-dormant accounts;• Combat disguised employment in the construction industry - proposals to deem construction workers as employed for tax purposes if they meet criteria which most people would regard as obvious signs of employment;• Ensure HMRC has the right resources, expertise and specialists, especially in investigation, enforcement, compliance and anti avoidance units;• Strengthen NAO powers to scrutinise tax reliefs, particularly where they are abused to avoid tax.
Proposed international tax reforms will be covered in the next post in this series.
Labour have also said that they would give (as yet unidentified) tax breaks to firms that pay the living wage and end the exploitative use of zero-hours contracts. By the end of the next parliament, Labour would increase the national minimum wage to £8 an hour.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsWedneday 12 November 2014
This is the fourth of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
As mentioned in the previous post, both Labour and the Lib Dems are targeting further reductions in tax relief on pension contributions, with Labour proposing to cut the rate for people earning over £150,000 a year from 45 to 20 per cent, and the Lib Dems planning to cap the lifetime fund limit at just £1 million. There are other proposals on the table too. In June Labour agreed to consider a plan from the thinktank the IPPR to save £2 billion a year by ending people's automatic right to take a quarter of their pension pot tax-free. Now Lib Dem Pensions Minister Steve Webb has floated the idea of having a single rate of relief for all, regardless of whether someone is a basic, higher or additional rate payer (or indeed not an income tax payer at all). Webb explained: "We spend something like £37 billion a year on tax relief for pensions and yet overwhelmingly the money goes to those who are already well off and who will end up with decent pensions in any case. We could probably spend less on pension tax relief overall… but also rebalance the money so that everyone, rich or poor, got help at the same rate."
In the coalition, however, the Lib Dems are supporting a pension-related tax cut. In his keynote speech to Conservative conference George Osborne announced the end of the so called 'death tax', saying the 55% rate that is currently applied to pension pots left by savers will be scrapped. Instead, beneficiaries of those with a drawdown arrangement who die before age 75 will be entitled to receive the deceased member's pension pot as a tax free lump sum; and for those who die after 75, the beneficiary will pay income tax at the marginal rate applying when withdrawals are made from the fund. Some have posed questions about whether the new set-up will be open to abuse. BBC analyst Simon Gompertz speculated whether, in future, pensions could become a method of preserving savings beyond the grave? Unlike most other Conservative announcements this has coalition agreement and will be implemented in the current session of Parliament. The Treasury predicts the new policy will cost approximately £150m per year.
The Conservatives, of course, promised inheritance tax (IHT) cuts in their 2010 election manifesto, but coalition discussions resulted in the Lib Dem priority of income tax cuts being put first. Shortly after this year's conference David Cameron excited his party and media supporters by saying he wanted to "shoehorn" into next March's Budget a policy to increase the £325,000 IHT threshold, however he later rowed back expectations by warning it would take "some time" before the Conservatives were able to cut IHT. It is almost certain that there will be a commitment on this in the party's manifesto next spring; a Budget announcement is possible but would be unlikely to gain Lib Dem support without a comparable boost for a policy favoured by them. In the end it may be the state of the public finances which determines whether this is a runner.
Pressure on IHT is coming particularly from UKIP, who favour scrapping the tax entirely, but there is also evidence that voters across the spectrum want the tax to go. On the conference fringe PwC's Head of Tax, Kevin Nicholson, set out some of the early findings from the firm's 'Future of Tax' project. Among the proposals backed by a 22 person Citizen's Jury was the scrapping of IHT. Also on the conference fringe Michael Izza of ICAEW highlighted that his Institute's manifesto calls for the tax to be scrapped.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsTuesday 4 November 2014
This is the third of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
Help 'for the many, not just the few' was a key Labour message at the conference. Most of the party's tax policies fit this theme, broadly taking money from a small number of wealthy and/or undeserving to help either a much larger number (eg. taxing mansion owners and tobacco companies to fund the NHS) or the particularly deserving (eg. taxing banks and bankers to help the unemployed and parents needing childcare).
Labour policies which arguably fit this model include:
Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats have announced tax increases mostly targeting the well heeled to pay for additional spending on the NHS. In his conference address Ed Miliband announced that Labour would create a £2.5 billion fund for the NHS. £1.2 billion of this would come from the mansion tax, £150 million from a new tax on tobacco firms (a 15 per cent levy on the sector's annual £1bn of profits) and the remainder from a series of measures characterised as cracking down on tax avoidance. Specifically these are:
The Lib Dems' more modest £1 billion NHS funding boost (which would especially be targeted at mental health services) would be funded by:
The Lib Dems have further tax increases aimed at high earners to fund a £500 increase in the personal allowance in 2016:
Both Labour and the Lib Dems also favour a form of 'mansion tax'. The Lib Dems reiterated their intention, originally announced in April, of introducing a mansion tax in the form of additional council tax bands for the highest value properties. Nick Clegg explained: "I went off, big time, the idea that you have a fixed levy as a percentage over a certain value. The more I looked at it, the more I thought, 'That's very crude.' It leads to eye-watering amounts of tax being paid. What we should do is go with the grain of the council tax system and apply bands to higher properties." An aide said this reform would be simpler to put into action as it did not require government to know the exact value of everyone's property over £2 million. The £1.7 billion expected to be raised by the measure would contribute to reducing the deficit. In his conference speech Clegg claimed the Conservatives had explicitly told the Lib Dems: "you can't have your mansion tax because our donors won't wear it."
Labour's plans have faced especially vocal criticism from inside and outside the party. Labour MP Margaret Hodge, Chair of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, branded it a "punishment tax" for those who happen to live in areas which have grown in value, a point echoed by other London Labour MPs. The party leadership are working hard to reassure the middle classes that they will not be affected, and to reassure members in London and the South East that it will not be a vote loser. In his conference speech, Ed Balls said the tax would be "fair, sensible and proportionate". He gave a number of assurances and clarifications, which were added to in a Sky News interview on October 5th and in an Evening Standard article on October 20th. The main ones are:
There is little support in the Conservative Party for additional taxes on the wealthy or high earners. An exception to this rule is ConservativeHome founder Tim Montgomerie, who made a case on the fringe that the mansion tax (amongst other wealth taxes) was not incompatible with conventional free market economics. He argued that large numbers of people had become wealthy not because of hard work but because they invested during the boom years of 'Britain's highly regulated' property market; those who benefited from state intervention should be taxed through state intervention.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsThursday 30 October 2014
This is the second of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
The stand-out announcement of the conference season was undoubtedly David Cameron's 'tax cut for 30 million people' – the promise in his conference speech that a Conservative Government would raise the income tax personal allowance to £12,500 and the higher rate threshold to £50,000 by 2020. These would give taxpayers earning between £12,500 and £42,000 an extra £500 a year and those on between £50,000 and £100,000 just over £2,100 extra. However the latter figure would be reduced to just over £1,300 if, as seems probable, the upper earnings limit for employee national insurance contributions (NICs) – that is the point up to which you pay 12% NICs rather than the 2% you pay above it – were raised along with the point at which higher rate income tax kicks in. The Treasury have been quoted by the BBC as saying the saving would be £1,313, which indicates they have factored this in.
The Conservatives have not explicitly said how the changes would be timed - whether they would be phased in over the full five years of the parliament or only introduced after the books have been balanced (that is, from 2018). David Cameron's remarks that "We will see the job through and… as we do that… [deliver] tax cuts" imply the latter. Treasury Committee Chair Andrew Tyrie certainly appears to believe this would be the case, noting in a recent interview that "these are tax cuts being offered before the headroom for them is available, conditional on the headroom, some years out". He added that, of course, "for them to have an effect on economic behaviour those pledges have to be believed." Then there are the costs. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said that the combined cost of the two income tax changes would be £7.2bn by 2020 (£1.6bn for the personal allowance increase and £5.6 billion for the increase in the higher rate threshold). This has been calculated using a baseline not of where the thresholds are now, but where they would be if both had been increased annually in the meantime at the rate of inflation. On this basis the IFS reckon the pledge is only worth about £160 a year for basic-rate taxpayers and £430 a year for those paying the higher rate.
The other parties have unsurprisingly reacted sceptically to the big Conservative announcement. Chris Leslie, Labour's Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, has written to George Osborne asking him to clarify how the cuts would be paid for, and reminding him of his own comments in November 2008 that "real tax cuts are funded, real tax cuts you show how you are going to pay for them". For the Lib Dems Nick Clegg accused David Cameron of "spraying around unfunded moon-on-a-stick-type promises" of tax cuts.
Of course raising the personal allowance to £12,500 was Lib Dem policy before it was Conservative policy, leading to some grumpiness at Lib Dem conference about the Tories 'plagiarising' their plans. The Lib Dems draw two distinctions between their plans and the Conservatives'. Firstly they argue their proposal is funded while the Conservatives' is not. To demonstrate that this is the case for at least the first instalment of the tax cut they announced that the party would raise the personal allowance to £11,000 in the first year of the next Parliament (ie. from April 2016), and set out how the £1.5 billion cost of doing so would be funded.
The second dividing line the Lib Dems draw is that their tax cut would be – to quote a (possibly deliberately) leaked draft of the front page of the party manifesto – "paid for by taxes on the richest" while the Conservatives' cut, if it could be delivered at all, would be paid for by the working age poor. The breakdown of where the Lib Dems would find the £1.5 billion for the 2016 tax cut is intended to illustrate this, consisting of increases to capital gains tax and anti-avoidance measures.
Once the Lib Dems have raised the income tax threshold to £12,500, they have said they will then start to increase the National Insurance (NI) threshold, with a long-term ambition to raise this to the same level as income tax.
Labour also have an income tax cut in their policy locker, albeit it one funded from an increase elsewhere. The party has reiterated its plan first announced a year ago to reintroduce the lower 10p starting rate of income tax that was introduced and then scrapped by the last Labour Government. A year ago this was to be funded by the mansion tax, but that is now being directed elsewhere (see below) so this will now be funded by the scrapping of the transferable allowance for married couples. Government estimates are that this allowance will cost £515 million in 2015/16 rising to £820m by 2018/19, which means that, unless additional funding can be identified, the 10p band will not be able to cover the full first £1,000 of earnings, as previously suggested by Labour (estimates of the cost of having a £1,000 band for the 10p rate range from £1.5 billion to £2 billion.) Ed Balls confirmed this in a post-conference interview in which he said Labour had not yet set a band for the 10p rate.
Labour's 10p rate proposal has faced criticism for adding further complexity to the tax system. At a Social Market Foundation (SMF) fringe meeting Paul Johnson of the IFS described it as "probably the stupidest thing you can do".
Conservative members, meanwhile, while welcoming the introduction of the transferable allowance, generally regard its initial value of £150 as far too little and want to see it increased quickly.
Labour figures have also expressed sympathy for increasing the NI threshold, while pointing out that raising the income tax threshold does less and less for the lowest paid. At the same SMF fringe that Paul Johnson spoke at Shadow DWP Minister Stephen Timms drew attention to the large proportion of the personal allowance increase which has been clawed back from low earners in cuts to tax credits. He saw a case for putting up the NI threshold but warned that the impact on the number of people contributing to contributory benefits had to be borne in mind.
Labour, of course, also want to return the additional rate to 50p.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsWednesday 29 October 2014
This is the first of a short series of blog articles looking at what we know about the direction of tax policy following this year's political party conference season. The CIOT is strictly politically neutral and nothing in this article should be interpreted as endorsement for or opposition to any of the policies mentioned.
This was a conference season where what wasn't said was as significant as what was. Labour leader Ed Miliband notably forgot to deliver the passage of his speech about the deficit – and was much derided for it – but you could be forgiven for thinking the whole of Britain's political class had suffered a fit of fiscal amnesia as - £100 billion deficit be damned - giveaway tax cuts and spending promises were sprayed around from the conference stages like Jeroboams of champagne on a Formula One podium.
Anyone would think there was an election on.
More sober analysis, however, suggested voters would be wise to do a little reading between the lines before dreaming of a land of milk and honey in the near future. The Financial Times' Economics Editor Chris Giles observed wryly: "Any conference delegate who also attended fringe events run by the Institute for Fiscal Studies think-tank and the Chartered Institute of Taxation could not have believed they were listening to descriptions of the same economy. The message from these sober experts was that Britain's public finances were still in a mess and the repair job to come will be more painful than the cuts to date."
The public finances: bringing the books into balance?
All three of the main UK parties are committed to 'balancing the books' in the next Parliament, but it turns out that this means slightly different things to each of them.
Labour's aim is to get the current (i.e. not including capital expenditure) budget into surplus and national debt falling as soon as possible in the next parliament. This commitment was endorsed by the party's National Policy Forum in July and reiterated by Ed Balls in his main conference speech. Balls said a Labour Government would "legislate for these tough fiscal rules in the first year after the election". Analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies estimated that Labour's commitment would require net tax rises or spending cuts of £18 billion (of which nearly £9 billion have been identified already by the coalition) between 2015-16 and 2018-19.
The Conservative Party's commitment to deficit reduction was prominent in Chancellor George Osborne's conference speech. Conceding that the budget deficit and the national debt were 'dangerously high', he renewed his party's commitment to going for an overall budget surplus – rather than just a surplus on the current budget – by 2018-19. In other words, the Conservatives want to ensure that government revenues are sufficient to pay not only for current spending but also for investment spending. This differentiates the party from Labour and would require them to carry out an extra £28 billion of fiscal tightening over and above those required by Labour – an additional £37 billion on top of the £9 billion already set out for next year.
The Liberal Democrats too say they would eliminate the deficit by April 2018, but they make an exception for additional investment in what Chief Secretary Danny Alexander calls "productive economic infrastructure – roads, railways, broadband, housing", so long as overall debt is falling as a proportion of GDP. The Lib Dems have also been clear that they are talking about the cyclically-adjusted current budget (that is, with adjustments made for the state of the economic cycle that we are at). However, given that the most recent forecasts from the Office of Budget Responsibility suggest that the output gap will close in 2018–19, meaning that cyclically-adjusted measures of borrowing are almost exactly the same as headline measures of borrowing in that year, that would leave the party in a similar position to Labour, with £28-29 billion of extra borrowing permitted above what the Conservatives are committed to.
The make up of fiscal tightening
George Osborne has provided more information about where the axe of a Conservative Government would fall, announcing that a further £12 billion would be cut from the social security budget, including a two year freeze in working age benefits which would save £3 billion. The remaining £25 billion would come entirely from non-social security public spending cuts, not from tax increases ("the option of taxing your way out of a deficit no longer exists, if it ever did" Osborne argued), and also not from the biggest spender, health, which will continue to be ring-fenced. Osborne said a commitment to reduce Whitehall spending by at least the same rate for the first two years of the next parliament as has been done in the current parliament would save some £13 billion. To this was added a commitment to restraining public sector pay.
The Liberal Democrats, on the other hand, made clear that, unlike their coalition partners, they do see further tax increases as having a part to play in balancing the Government's books. Asked on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show whether he would raise taxes, party leader Nick Clegg said: "Yes, of course." The deputy PM added: "No one anywhere in the reasonable world thinks you can fill the black hole in public finances either through spending reductions – though George Osborne and the Conservatives do now – or by taxes on their own. The received wisdom is that you should have roughly about 20% of tax increases versus 80% of spending reductions. That is the mix broadly speaking we have aspired to in this government." There are indications some in the party, including Business Secretary Vince Cable, would prefer a higher proportion of tax rises than that. Cable told the BBC's Newsnight that the current 80/20 mix between spending cuts and tax rises should be "rebalanced", with a greater emphasis on tax rises. Cable is believed to favour a mix of at least 60/40.
Labour have also said that tax increases should have a part to play in deficit reduction, and have indicated that the proceeds of putting the additional rate of income tax back to 50p would be used for this purpose. Both Labour and the Lib Dems have committed to using tax changes to make fiscal austerity 'fairer'. The Lib Dems have promised a 'fairness rule' to ensure that the wealthiest people continue to contribute most to deficit reduction. For Labour, Ed Balls vowed that, "unlike the Tories we will always ask those who have the most to make the biggest contribution". Additionally, Chris Leslie MP, Shadow Chief Secretary, is conducting a 'Zero-Based Review' of public spending, examining every pound spent by government to cut out waste and make different choices. Leslie stressed to a CIOT/IFS fringe meeting that Labour did not see public service cuts as part of an ideological drive to shrink the state; social benefit would be best felt through the 'pooling of our taxes'. He said that more concrete proposals on how to plug the gap would be unveiled in the party's manifesto next spring.
George CrozierCIOT Head of External RelationsThursday 23 October 2014
Tax devolution has been a major theme of the conference season so it was particularly fitting that Scotland's largest city provided the stage for the final CIOT / Institute for Fiscal Studies party conference debate on Balancing the Books – tax and spending choices in the next Parliament, which took place at Liberal Democrat conference in Glasgow's SECC. Douglas Fraser, Business & Economy Editor for BBC Scotland took the Chair whilst the panel featured IFS Director Paul Johnson, CIOT President Anne Fairpo and Ian Swales MP, Co-Chair of the Lib Dem Backbench Treasury Committee.
Mr Fraser set the course for the debate reminding the audience of key Lib Dem tax proposals, most prominently increasing the personal allowance to £12,500 and the introduction of a 'mansion tax' on high-value properties.
Paul Johnson was first to speak and after guiding the audience through current tax and spending challenges focused on how the Lib Dems were intending to achieve fiscal consolidation. The Lib Dems have stated they will seek to balance the cyclically-adjusted current budget from 2017-18 onwards. Given that the latest OBR forecasts suggest that the output gap will close in 2018-19, meaning that cyclically-adjusted measures of borrowing are almost exactly the same as headline measures of borrowing in that year, that would leave the party with a similar commitment to Labour, with £28-29 billion of extra borrowing permitted.
Next to speak was Anne Fairpo who suggested that the issue of balancing the books fed into the broader theme of reshaping the state. She emphasised that whilst much media attention concentrated on tax avoidance, tax evasion (activity which is illegal) was a far larger part of the tax gap. Anne focused on three areas of current resonance: BEPS (the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project dealing with the profit allocation of multinational corporations), tax devolution and self-employment. Ms Fairpo struck a cautionary note on BEPS. She remarked that the impression that the system would result in the UK receiving its 'fair share' of tax overlooked the fact that the wording of the rules may mean a quite different reality. The attractiveness of the UK, particularly its low corporation tax rate, could be under threat from the OECD's flagship project. There would be winners and losers as a result of profit allocation and it could spur significant tax competition. On devolution, Ms Fairpo remarked that this too could lead to tax competition. Finally, the significant rise in self-employment (we are now broadly in line with the EU average), predominantly in the low-skilled sector, was identified as a key reason for the decline in income tax receipts to the Treasury.
Ian Swales offered a less technical and more political perspective. He emphasised the need for fiscal responsibility and opined that debt was increasingly viewed as an inter-generational issue. He felt that there was a moral difference between debt that came as a result of paying for a good such as a motorway that his grandchildren would use and debt accrued as a result of keeping tax rates artificially low. He argued for a further increase in the income tax personal allowance (paid for by lowering the capital gains tax threshold and a crackdown on evasion) in order to reduce inequality. On capital gains tax, Mr Swales remarked that there was a 'strong' case for alignment with income tax. On spending, he said the current rate of VAT was about right. He defended the 'mansion tax' as an effective, limited way to tax wealth and opposed Conservative proposals to raise the IHT threshold to £1m, arguing it should be kept at £325,000.
Mr Swales was candid about spending challenges and remarked that there was a long way to go; public sector efficiency had to be improved. He reminded the audience that Labour had added a million jobs to the public sector payroll, almost all of which had been taken off by the coalition government without considerable damage to service.
Douglas Fraser quizzed Paul Johnson on balancing the budget at a higher tax rate as the floor was opened for questions. Mr Johnson responded that, technically, the economy can work with a 40% rather than 38% tax take but the more you take in tax the more efficient the system needs to be. He identified capital gains tax and VAT as areas of particular complexity. He lauded the scale of tax cuts pursued by the Government at a time of 'astonishing austerity'.
In response to the devolution of certain taxes to Scotland and what benefits they may bring, Anne Fairpo remarked that the devolution of CGT and IHT was unlikely to bring in much money though she conceded it may make devolved governments feel 'more in control'. Mr Johnson agreed and remarked that it would result in significant complexity and that resistance to inheritance tax was growing.
Responding to a question on care for the elderly, Ian Swales made the point that taxing low income people in order to pay for the care of those who were better off so that their children could inherit more was morally indefensible.
Paul Johnson finished his remarks by singling out SDLT as a particularly inefficient tax and arguing that more tax revenue would be raised through a proportional council tax. On income tax, he felt that the distributional effect of the current rise had benefited middle income earners the most. On Lib Dem proposals to further raise the threshold he said the point at which you start to pay income tax had become a 'totem' but, in his view, it was 'clearly better' to increase the point at which you start to pay national insurance contributions, as this had fallen so far behind the income tax threshold.
James KnellCIOT External Relations OfficerWednesday 15th October 2014
'We have cut more in business taxes in this parliament than in any other parliament over the course of our history' was the triumphant message delivered to a Conservative conference fringe audience by David Gauke MP. However, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury cautioned that the road to cutting the deficit would see social security make an increasingly substantial contribution. The debate, Balancing the Books, focusing on tax and spending choices facing the next parliament, was jointly held by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) and the CIOT and took place in Birmingham on September 30th. The event was chaired by the Financial Times' tax journalist, Vanessa Houlder, and speaking alongside Mr Gauke were Patrick Stevens, Tax Policy Director of the CIOT, and Paul Johnson, IFS Director.
Mr Johnson commenced the debate by guiding the audience through the fiscal landscape, reminding them that the Government remained only halfway to its goal of balancing the books. Responding to Mr Gauke's warning over welfare, Mr Johnson argued that finding £12 billion (6% of the total) from the social security budget would be a significant challenge, and would still imply cuts of 31% in unprotected departments.
Patrick Stevens focused on addressing three areas likely to alter the tax take: BEPS, self-employment and tax devolution. On BEPS (the OECD's Base Erosion and Profit-Shifting project designed to amend the rules regarding the taxation of multinational companies), Mr Stevens said that there was wide acceptance that the current system was 'broke'. BEPS would mean that our corporate tax base was likely to see a slight decrease but whether we would 'win' or 'lose' was ultimately a matter of opinion. Self-employment had risen markedly, and such individuals tended to pay less in tax and later (they pay less national insurance), meaning that the Treasury was witnessing a decrease in tax receipts. Finally, devolution, a major theme of the conference season, was touched on. Mr Stevens informed the audience that there was an expectation of considerably more tax devolution, particularly in the wake of the Scottish referendum, and that the Scottish Government was already about to get the power to increase or decrease income tax by up to ten per cent. He finished by declaring that it was yet to be seen how tax competition might affect the overall take.
David Gauke focused on his Government's efforts to reduce the deficit and the part that taxation was playing in that effort. He remarked that the amount now spent on debt interest payments was a very significant sum. Planning for the future, he said that there were significant pressures on the budget; many of the baby boomers would be in nursing homes by the 2030's and that was a stark argument against Labour proposals to run a current budget surplus, allowing them to borrow an extra £28 billion. Mr Gauke reminded the audience that the Government had focused overwhelmingly on reducing spending rather than tax increases. Indeed, for the first time since 1950, public spending had fallen, by 1.4%. He cited growth as a result of business tax cuts: introduction of the patent box, increased employment allowance and a decrease in corporation tax. He attacked Labour's 50p top rate of income tax policy in view of the mobility of capital and people. He finished by praising his department's soon to be sent out personal tax statements which he said would increase HMRC transparency and public knowledge of how taxpayer money is spent.
More than sixty attendees provided a challenging Q&A session for the panel. A representative from the TaxPayers' Alliance questioned whether it was a sustainable policy to run surplus after surplus until debt was zero. Mr Gauke understood the 'it's our money' logic but noted that we remained a long way from running a surplus.
An audience member asked if Conservative targets to tackle the deficit, with their 'disproportionate' focus on cutting welfare, were achievable. Responding, Paul Johnson remarked that he was sceptical about the ring-fencing of pensions and health and there needed to be a more public conversation about how we would pay for them.
Questions also focused on the increased size of central government but Mr Gauke defended his department saying it had decreased its size and increased efficiency. He also commented briefly on the raising of the retirement age which had made the long term fiscal situation less grim that it might otherwise have been.
Finally, the panel were quizzed on devolution. Richard Johnson of Public Finance Magazine asked whether the current system of setting national taxes had anything to recommend it. David Gauke remarked that some taxes were better suited to devolution than others and lauded the devolution of income taxes to Scotland. He said that tax competition could be advantageous in bringing to people's attention the dangers of wrongheaded taxes. He cautioned against the devolution of corporation tax north of the border as this would result in uncertainty for Scottish businesses. For Paul Johnson, fiscal choice was ultimately about where the decisions came from, reminding the audience that outside of Scotland local government was responsible for only about 20 per cent of spending; the rest came from Whitehall.
James KnellCIOT External Relations OfficerFriday 10th October 2014
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Fisher Price RainForest Jumperoo
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subset: commoncrawl


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Season 2Comments1k
213pages on
this wiki
this wiki
Season 2 of The Next Step premiered on March 7, 2014 and will consist of 26 episodes. Season 2.5 begins on September 12.
Season 2.0 Edit
- Don't Stop The Party (my boyfriends back) (ready to start)
- The Final Cut (The Girl is Mine)
- Work It
- It Takes Two
- What'll I Do
- Never Enough
- I Hope I Get It
- Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better
- Time To Move On
- The Truth Comes Out
- Sing
- You're The One That I Want
- Hazy Shade Of Winter
- Game On
Season 2.5 Edit
Season 2.5 of The Next Step will premiere on September 12, 2014
- Make A Plan To Love Me
- Sacrifice
- Heartbreaker
- Hello Trouble
- Lost
- Better Than This
- Under Pressure
- Just Dance
- Water It
- Run This Town
- Re-Match
New Characters Edit
- Hunter played by Zac Vran
- Thalia played by Taveeta Szymanowicz
- Phoebe played by Natalie Krill
Other Facts About Season 2Edit
- Chris leaves the studio.
- Phoebe replaces Chris as the head choreographer.
- Michelle and Eldon break up within the next couple of episodes.
- Chloe teaches Baby Ballet Class as a job at the studio to pay for dance at The Next Step.
- Riley and James win their duet to Giselle and Thalia.
- Riley and James break up, but get back together again.
- New episodes of The Next Step will be aired on September 12, 2014.
- Filming for Season 3 began on July 29, 2014.


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Lab49 Interview Questions
Interview Experience
Interview Experience
Getting an Interview
Getting an Interview
Interview Difficulty
Interviews for Top Jobs at Lab49
- Software Engineer (7)
- Senior Developer (4)
- Java Developer (4)
- Senior Software Engineer (3)
- Senior Consultant (3)
- Developer (3)
- Senior Software Developer (2)
- Delivery Manager (1)
- Front-End Engineer (1)
- Confidential Position (1)
- Front End Developer - Javascript/HTML5 (1)
- Consultant (1)
- .NET Developer (1)
- Automation Engineer (1)
- Senior Associate (1)
- Front-End Web Developer (1)
- Software Developer (1)
- Java Software Engineer (1)
- Agile Project Manager (1)
- Associate (1)
Candidate Interview ReviewsSort: Popular Date Difficulty
- Application Details
I applied online. The process took 2+ weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in April 2014.Interview Details
Interview process was quite technical. It started out with the Lab49 recruiter herself asking a series of technical questions with 2 choices. Then came 2 phone interviews where the interviewers asked the usual multithreading concurrency framework, object oriented programming and spring questions. The 2nd phone interviewer asked me to design a class which would execute parallel tasks in a non-blocking fashion. The 3rd interview was on skype with a senior staff engineer from Lab49. This was more design oriented and the interviewer was not very patient with me and seemed to judge me from a pre-conceived bias. He barely asked me questions for 20 minutes and abruptly ended the interview although I did answer most of the questions correctly.Interview Questions
No OfferNegative ExperienceDifficult Interview
- Design a non-blocking executor framework which handles multiple tasks concurrently. Answer Question
- Application Details
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 2 weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in April 2014.Interview Details
1.Recruiter asked me few multiple choice questions and later she scheduled a phone screen
Got a call from UK and asked about my automation skills and framework details and it was went well.2nd level also phone screen interview.Somebody from NYC called me and it went well. Later scheduled me 3-4hrs of interview at onsite interview
1.They gave me some 30 min test on basic programming skills in Java,Automation skills,SQL and Linux
2.automation engineer had taken 30 min discussion and drilled down my automation skills and frameworks which I was working on
3.Another person (I guess he is a techno PM) gave me few scenarios in real time and asked me to prepare the plan of execution
4.Finally QA Global head took 20 min and asked me all my previous experience on Agile/Automation and process.
I like the whole process of discussion .Interview Questions
No OfferPositive ExperienceDifficult Interview
- Linux and SQL Questions Answer Question
1 person found this helpfulInterview Details
Terrible. Idiot apparently didnt realize that Java developer != Java Jepordy....oh...and the next time you try and trip someone on concurrency....you might want to actually know something about concurrency.Interview Questions
No Offer
- Why are you asking questions about how exactly the jvm handles memory management? Why was this important? Was this a Java dev interview or an interview for a C/C++ developer? Answer Question
- Application Details
I applied online. The process took 2 weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in March 2014.Interview Details
Initial Phone Screen by Recruiter followed by technical phone screen. Recruiters are good and nice to talk with. Then came the Tech interview. He called me 10 mins later and then started talking all nonsense - we don't have managers here, we work for only 50+ billion dollar companies, all are seniors here & what not. Finally 10 mins he asked some basic java questions which he also not sure when I responded with a question back he continued saying ok lets leave it... Finally it ended & I was relieved. Bad experienceInterview Questions
No OfferNegative ExperienceAverage Interview
- Nothing difficult question.. Interviewer was a difficult person :) Answer Question
- Application Details
I applied through a recruiter. The process took a week – interviewed at Lab49 in March 2014.Interview Details
I was contacted via LinkedIn.
The recruiter was fairly enthusiastic about the company and largely sold me on the idea of working for them. Then, came the ten or so multiple choice trivia questions that she asked.
They seemed to be satisfied with my answers, so they scheduled me for a phone interview. However, approximately 5 minutes before the phone interview was scheduled to begin, I received an e-mail stating that they'd need to reschedule.
Having conducted many technical interviews at my current job, I know that asking trivia questions, even as a gateway to a more advanced technical phone screen is not a good idea since you will get too many false positives and too many false negatives. Not only that, being asked to reschedule, 5 minutes prior to the interview is also very unprofessional and I've never been in the position where I've had to do such a thing to a candidate whenever I've been scheduled to conduct an interview.Interview Questions
No OfferNegative ExperienceEasy Interview
- Multiple choice trivia questions. Answer Question
1 person found this helpfulApplication Details
I applied through other source. The process took 3 weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in February 2014.Interview Details
The company found my profile in LinkedIn, the vacancy looked interesting so we decided to start the interviewing process. The process itself consist of several parts: at least two technical phone interviews, one Skype interview with a Senior Stuff Member.
Technical interviews were quite professional: the first one was about OOP, Java Basics(collections, structures), the second one was about Threads, non-blocking algorithms, Design Patterns and how to apply them, we also designed a hierarchy of objects for a given business domain.
Everything was really promising and enjoyable by me as a Java Developer because until the third interview I hadn't got any weird, odd and unsuitable questions as we do in many cases having interviews around.
So the third interview was with a Senior Stuff Member, who I didn't get the position of, but after that interview I received a very short answer that they are not going to proceed with my candidacy without any explanation why. All questions were about me become a Java Developer, have I ever heard about other Java-based languages and if I used them, about projects I participated in and which problem I faced there. So it was just a chat between two people.
I feel frustrating and don't really satisfied with the result because they didn't clarify the purpose of decline.Interview Questions
No OfferNegative ExperienceAverage Interview
- Non-blocking algorithms Answer Question
- Application Details
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 4+ weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in February 2014.Interview Details
I was contacted by a recruiter from this company who was impressed by my on-line profile. The recruiter strongly praised the company. I decided to give a try. The interview process started with two technical interviews by phone. Almost all questions were about Java Core and Multithreading. They were quite average. I didn't have any problems with them. Then I was given a programming task. That task was intended to check Multithreading skills, which I successfully performed. So far so good. The next interview, which turned out final, was with an inadequate person, who in around 15 mins interrupted me with phrase if I had any questions for them and stopped the interview. After that I got an excuse email that I didn't pass the last interview. So, I very much doubt about the competence of that person who made the decision obviously without regard to my huge technical background and previously successful interviews. In conclusion I want to mention that all this embarrassment took 1 month.Interview Questions
No OfferNegative ExperienceAverage Interview
- All technical questions were quite average (in my opinion). Answer Question
- Application Details
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 2 weeks – interviewed at Lab49.Interview Details
Contacted via Linked in. Short phone interview, than 2.5 hour in person interview with 2 managers, then 40 minutes with a VP.Interview Questions
Reasons for Declining
- Detailed, in depth end-to-end software design questions. Designing the front/back end for a mobile application. Answer Question
Got a better offer elsewhereDeclined OfferAverage Interview
- Application Details
I applied online. The process took 2+ weeks – interviewed at Lab49 in December 2013.Interview Details
Great HR team. They were probably the smoothest, quickest HR to deal with in my entire life. That part they have nailed down. Interview process included a couple of phone interviews, on-site interviews. Questions included were general .net framework questions, some threading questions, a little bit on data structures. On-site interview included some questions on WPF, they made take a computer test where I had to tweak a little bit of the code there, which I thought was awesome. Then some questions on WPF in general, which should be easily answerable for some one with a few years experience in that domain. Seemed good bunch of people. The office looked very sharp and slick with a great view.
I think overall if you want to stick to UI work, or web design, HTML 5 this seems a great place. They seem to have bunch of primarily web design folks in their office. But if you interested in more intense server side stuff, or more in computer science, this probably isn't the place for you.Interview Questions
Reasons for Declining
- Nothing really unexpected, standard questions. Answer Question
Found better offer elsewhere.Declined OfferPositive ExperienceAverage Interview
- Application Details
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 2+ months – interviewed at Lab49.Interview Details
* Introductory call with recruiter.
* Technical phone interview with engineer.
* Live coding challenge, done over the phone with screen-sharing, using Node.js with an option of using CoffeeScript. Involved multiple separate challenges to complete, each of which came with a test suite for the interviewee to check his/her work.
* Multiple on-site interviews, including multiple technical interviews covering different areas including JavaScript, CSS, and system architecture.Interview Questions
No OfferPositive ExperienceAverage Interview
- Design the back-end architecture for a music-recognition service on the whiteboard. Answer Question
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Michael Bay, Megan Fox Kiss And Make Up
As they say, time heals everything.
Michael Bay announced Thursday that he has hired Megan Fox to star in his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot.
"We are bringing Megan Fox back into the family!" The controversial director wrote on his official website.
"[Bay] wants to be like Hitler on his sets, and he is. So, he's a nightmare to work for," she said in the now-infamous interview.
Bay later replaced her in the Transformers series with supermodel Rosie Huntington-Whiteley.
In a 2011 interview with GQ, he finally confirmed that, yes, he had fired Fox because of "you know, the Hitler thing."According to the Hollywood Reporter, Fox will play April O'Neil, the real-life friend of the Ninja Turtles, in the much-anticipated movie, out 2014.