Part Payment in UK Law

The second is that at no stage did Mrs Painting manifest any willingness to negotiate or to put forward a counter-proposal to the Part 36 payment. However to contest and lose an issue of exaggeration without having made ever a counter-proposal is a matter of some significance in this kind of litigation. It must not be assumed that beating a Part 36 payment is conclusive. It is a factor and will often be conclusive, but one has to have regard to all the circumstances of the case.

The Court has a discretion which it willexercise considering all the circumstances of the particular case. Mr. Levy helpfully suggests some of the matters which the Court might take into account, such as whether the company's claim is bona fide and not a sham and whether the company has a reasonably good prospect of success.

Once the taxpayer has identified the payment the question to be asked is: did he obtain anything - anything at all - used or to be used for the purposes of his business in return for that payment? This will normally consist of the supply of goods or services to the taxpayer. But it may equally well consist of the right to have goods delivered or services rendered to a third party.

But when an expenditure is made, not only once and for all, but with a view to bringing into existence an asset or an advantage for the enduring benefit of a trade, I think that there is very good reason (in the absence of special circumstances leading to an opposite conclusion) for treating such an expenditure as properly attributable not to revenue but to capital.

Where there has bean a true accord, under which the creditor voluntarily agrees to accept a lesser sum in satisfaction, and the debtor acts upon that accord by paying the lesser sum and the creditor accepts it, then it is inequitable for the creditor afterwards to insist on the balance. But he is not bound unless there has been truly an accord between them.

In times of stable currency the multipliers that were used by judges were appropriate to interest rates of 4% to 5% whether the judges using them were conscious of this or not. Inflation is taken care of in a rough and ready way by the higher rates of interest obtainable as one of the consequences of it and no other practical basis of calculation has been suggested that is capable of dealing with so conjectural a factor with greater precision.