- Who should register
- How to register
- Transfer of a business as a going concern
- Applying for group treatment for registration
- Representation of an unincorporated body
- Reporting inaccuracies and changes to Scottish Aggregates Tax registration details
- Cancellation of registration
- Notification of cessation of exploitation of exempt aggregate
- Publication of the Scottish Aggregates Tax register
Who should register
If you commercially exploit taxable aggregate or you intend to commercially exploit taxable aggregate in Scotland, then you should register with Revenue Scotland for the Scottish Aggregates Tax. This includes businesses in England, Wales or Northern Ireland who supply aggregate in Scotland (see Cross Border guidance).
The registered person can be, but is not limited to:
- a sole proprietor. The sole proprietor is liable for all their obligations and liabilities in relation to Scottish Aggregates Tax, including telling us about any liability to be registered
- a partnership. Each partner is joint and severally liable for all the obligations and liabilities of the partnership in relation to Scottish Aggregates Tax, including telling us about any liability to be registered
- a company
- a group of companies. In certain circumstances companies under common control can apply for group treatment - this will enable a group of companies to account for Scottish Aggregates Tax under a single registration. A representative member of the group must be nominated, and they are required to tell us about any liability to register. See group treatment for registration for further details.
When to register
You must tell us of your liability to register within 30 days of the earliest of commercially exploiting aggregate or of forming the intention to commercially exploit aggregate. If you fail to tell us on time you may be liable to a penalty.
Non-UK residents
If you are a non-UK resident and you commercially exploit aggregate in the UK, you must register for the tax and appoint a UK tax representative. Both you and your representative must each notify Revenue Scotland separately. You must do this within 30 days of the tax representative being appointed.
The appointed UK tax representative is responsible for making sure you meet all your obligations and pay all liabilities in relation to the tax. You and your tax representative are jointly and severally liable for your obligations in relation to Scottish Aggregates Tax.
Your UK tax representative must tell us within 30 days of any of these changes:
- changes to the name, constitution or ownership of the tax representative’s business
- changes to the registration details
- if they cease to be the UK tax representative
- if they’re no longer eligible to be the UK tax representative
If you fail to appoint a UK tax representative when you are obliged to do so then you may be charged a penalty of £10,000.
Should you wish to change your tax representative you must apply to Revenue Scotland to do so.
See the Failure to request approval of tax representative appointment for further details.
Exemption from registration
If the only taxable activity that you are carrying out or intend to carry out is the commercial exploitation of exempt aggregate, then you do not need to register for Scottish Aggregates Tax, though you will have to notify us. See the Exemption guidance for further details on when aggregate can be considered exempt.
Notifying us about exploiting exempt aggregate
Although you do not have to register for Scottish Aggregates Tax if you commercially exploit exempt aggregate, you must still tell us if you commercially exploit the following types of exempt aggregate:
- coal, lignite or slate
- processing waste from the separation of coal, lignite or slate from other rock after extraction
- processing waste from the separation of certain industrial minerals from other rock after extraction
- clay
You must notify us within 30 days of intending to commercially exploit the exempt aggregate. You may provide this notification by completing this form. Further guidance on completing this form can be found in this ‘how to’ guidance.
Revenue Scotland led registration
If you are liable to be registered for Scottish Aggregates Tax, but have not registered or notified us, we may register you. We may register you with effect from the time you began to carry out taxable activities.
How to register
We have provided separate guidance on How to register for Scottish Aggregates Tax at ------ which tells you how to notify us of your intentions to be registered for Scottish Aggregates Tax.
You can notify us about your registration using our online registration form. If you are having issues with this form or require an alternative way to notify us of your registration, then please contact us.
Once we have processed your application, we will provide you with your unique Scottish Aggregates Tax registration number and confirm the date from which your registration takes effect.
If the details you provide at registration change then you must notify us. If you fail to notify us of a change then you may be charged a penalty.
Transfer of a Business as a going concern
If you acquire a Scottish Aggregates Tax registered business as a going concern you may take the existing Scottish Aggregates Tax registration number from the person who transferred the business. If you wish to do this then you and the transferor must make a joint application to us. You can fill out a joint application using this online form.
If a joint application is made, then the transferor does not need to notify us about ceasing to have the intention to carry out taxable activities in order to de-register for tax.
If a joint application is not made, then the transferor will need to de-register for tax, and you will need to separately notify us in order to register for tax as a new taxpayer.
If you have taken the transferor’s registration number:
- you will become responsible for all existing liabilities of the transferor to make a Scottish Aggregates Tax return and pay tax
- you will become entitled to any existing Scottish Aggregates Tax credits of the transferor
- any other provision or circumstance relating to the transferor’s Scottish aggregates Tax Obligations will apply to you
If you were allocated the transferor’s Scottish Aggregates Tax registration number during an accounting period subsequent to that in which the transfer took place, then any:
- return that has been made
- tax that has been accounted for
- entitlement to credit that has been claimed
by either you or the transferor is treated as having been done by you.
Applying for group treatment for registration
If one or more company is under common control, then they may apply for group registration for Scottish Aggregates Tax.
This will mean that the group will be treated as one person and therefore only one combined registration and one combined Scottish Aggregates Tax return will be required for the group.
Companies can be said to be under common control if:
- one of the companies controls each of the others
- an individual, a company or a partnership controls all of them
One body controls another if it is empowered by statute to control that body's activities, or if it is that body's holding company within the meaning of section 1159 of the Companies Act 2006. An individual may be regarded as a controlling body if the individual holds control over the other bodies in the same way as a holding company.
The group must nominate a representative member who will be responsible for completing the registration and submitting group tax returns.
The representative member must have an established place of business in the UK.
The application must be made not less than 90 days before the date from which it is to take effect, unless we have allowed a different time.
All the companies in the prospective group must be parties to the application but any one of those companies (or the person controlling them) can make the application.
If we accept the application, the companies are to be treated as a group from the beginning of an accounting period, and the company named in the application as the representative member will thereafter be treated as the representative member. We can only refuse an application if it appears to us that it is necessary to do for the purposes of protecting the revenue.
Once the application is accepted:
- any liability of a member of the group to pay tax is to be taken to be a liability of the representative member
- the representative member is to be taken to carry out any taxable activities which a member of the group would carry out
- all members of the group will then be jointly and severally liable for any tax due from the representative member
For guidance on how to make the application for group treatment, see the separate guidance covering – How to register guidance.
Changes to group registration once it is in place
Once the group registration is in place, changes can be made to either group membership (adding or removing a member) or the representative member by one of the members making a further application to us. See Reporting Inaccuracies and changes to Scottish Aggregates Tax Registration details for information on how to make a change to your Scottish Aggregates Tax group.
If a member of the group ceases to be eligible to be part of the group, for example if they cease to be under common control, then they must inform us immediately. If they fail to do so, then a penalty may be charged.
A representative member of a Scottish Aggregates Tax group must first inform us before they cease to have an established place of business within the UK. If they fail to do so then a penalty may be charged.
If you have made an application in relation to group treatment or changes to a group and the information in that application has become inaccurate then you must notify us of this fact. If you fail to do so, then a penalty may be charged.
In addition, if no application of change has been made to us and it appears that a company that we have treated as a member of a group, or a representative member is now not eligible for this status then we will notify the company and the group of this fact and provide details of the updated group status. Penalties may also be charged.
You can find more information about penalties here: Penalties Guidance.
Representation of an unincorporated body
Rules for unincorporated bodies other than partnerships
If you have registered as an unincorporated body that is not a partnership then any legislative requirements of Scottish Aggregates Tax are the joint and several responsibility of every member holding office as president, chairman, treasurer, secretary or any similar office.
If there is no such office, the joint and several liability falls to every member holding office as a member of a committee by which the affairs of the body are managed.
If there is no such committee then joint and several liability falls to every member.
Any Scottish Aggregates Tax requirement can be fulfilled by any of the above persons unless the requirement is a notification of:
- commercial exploitation of exempt aggregate
- taxable activity (registration)
- cessation of taxable activities
- changes in particulars
If any of the above notifications are required, then it must be one of the persons who has joint and several liability that makes the notification.
For example, if you are registering as an unincorporated body that is made up of a president, treasurer and other non-committee members then joint and several responsibility for all requirements fall to the president and treasurer. Either the president or treasurer must make the notification of taxable activity (registration) but any of the members (including the president and treasurer) can undertake any requirement not listed in the bullet points above.
Rules for unincorporated bodies which are partnerships
If a partnership is required to do anything in relation to Scottish Aggregates Tax it is the joint and several responsibility of every partner to comply with the requirement.
Any of the partners can carry out the requirement or, in the case of a partnership whose principal place of business is in Scotland, any other person authorised by the partnership.
Reporting inaccuracies and changes to Scottish Aggregates Tax registration details
Once you have notified us about your intention to carry out taxable activities or your intention to carry out commercial exploitation of exempt aggregate there are certain circumstances where you are required to notify us about any changes to your registration, including:
- inaccuracies in your original notification
- changes of circumstances that have resulted in any information you have provided to become inaccurate
- changes in relation to you, your business or any other matter that is detailed in the register
The changes that you must notify us of include (but are not limited to):
- your name, trading name, address or principal place of business
- your status (as a sole trader, partner, company etc)
- the name and address of a partner or change of the membership of the partnership
- the name and address of a trustee or beneficiary of a trust
- your site details
You must notify us if any of the above changes occur, you can do so by Reporting inaccuracies and changes to Scottish Aggregates Tax registration.
The notification should be made within 30 days of the earlier of:
- discovering or being in a position to rectify the inaccuracy of the original notification, or
- after the change in circumstances occurred
Where Revenue Scotland become aware of inaccuracies or changes of a similar nature to those outlined above, we will try and contact you to confirm your registration requires an update. If we are unable to reach you, we may make the changes on your behalf.
We may use this information to maintain and update the register which we will publish on our website.
If you fail to comply with any of the above requirements, you may be liable to a penalty.
Cancellation of registration
Once you are registered for Scottish Aggregates Tax, you must notify us (through secure message) if you have ceased to have the intention to carry out taxable activities. You must do this within 30 days of the date the intention ceased, or the date taxable activities ceased if this is different, so that we can de-register you for Scottish Aggregates Tax.
You must tell us the date on which you ceased to have the intention of carrying out taxable activities and, if different, the date on which you ceased (or will cease) to carry out taxable activities.
Once we are satisfied that you have ceased all taxable activity, we will cancel your registration from the earliest practical time after you ceased all taxable activities. If you have registered and have subsequently not carried out any taxable activity, we will cancel your registration from the date you registered.
We do not have to cancel your registration, if we are not satisfied that:
- you will not carry out (resumption of) taxable activities
- all tax you are due to pay has been paid
- there is no outstanding credit you may be entitled to
If you have ceased undertaking taxable activity but have started or continued to only commercially exploit certain types of exempt aggregate, then you must notify Revenue Scotland in the same way. Revenue Scotland will cancel your registration from the date in which you ceased to carry out taxable activity.
If you have been de-registered by us, and subsequently discover you are entitled to a repayment in relation to credit, see the following guidance for further information:
Notification of cessation of exploitation of exempt aggregate
If you have notified us that you are undertaking the commercial exploitation of exempt aggregate and you intend to cease this activity, then you must notify us within 30 days of the cessation of that activity.
You can notify us via secure message.
Publication of the Scottish Aggregates Tax register
We maintain an internal Scottish Aggregates Tax register containing the information you supply at registration. This is necessary for us to manage the tax.
We will also maintain a publicly available register which will detail [the names, business addresses and Scottish Aggregates Tax registration numbers] of those registered for Scottish Aggregates Tax. We will not publish any financial or confidential information you supply to us.