It Does Not Pay To Retire If In Business

It is not financially wise to retire - or rather you can save a lot of inheritance tax if you do not retire.

In a drive to encourage business succession the government introduced "BUSINESS RELIEF FOR INHERITANCE TAX" many years ago. [https://www.gov.uk/inheritance-tax ]

The ownership of a business or shares in a business is included in the estate for inheritance tax ourposes BUT you can get BUSINESS RELIEF of either 50% or 100% on some of an estate's business assets which can be passed on:

- while the owner is still alive ( https://www.gov.uk/business-relief-inheritance-tax/give-away-business-property-or-assts )

- as part of a will

You can get 100% Business Relief on a business or interest in a business &/or shares in an unlisted company; if certian conditions are not met one can only get 50% releif.

You can only get Business relief if the deceased owned the business or asset for at least 2 years before they died. The executor of the the will or admisnistrator of the estate can claim using forms IHT400 and IHT413.