Would you like a W7 to go with that?

It's a fact throughout history, tax collectors have always been hated.  You hear about it in the New Testament before you're even old enough to know what a tax really is (at least you do if you go to Catholic school).  You hear about in legends from all around the world (see above) and perhaps most notably from the tales of Robin Hood.  It has never been a popular occupation.

So why, when you make people fill in their own paperwork, would you make it vastly more difficult than it needs to be?  I used to think HMRC forms were complicated.  Then I published through a US based print on demand company and now I realise HMRC are incredibly plain speaking and helpful.

The blinding pain in my head came on after trying to read (and retain the information) in the instruction papers for completing forms for the IRS.  My tip to them would be when you set out to explain what someone must enter on a particular line, explain what the line means and don't just list the same points with 'if you are' and 'check this box'.  I'd worked that much out already.  What I didn't know was what that particular definition referred to in the first place.  If I don't know, by your definitions, which bracket I fall into, your explanations of checking the boxes for particular brackets make no sense.  I don't know whether I need an EIN or an ITIN, but I managed to complete the W8-BEN despite not knowing whether I need an SS-4 or a W7 to go with that.  Whichever it might be, I've tried completing both in readiness and I can't make head nor tail of anything other than name and address.

I think the pain in my head might be something about to burst.  All I want to do is inform the IRS that I'm English and resident in England but have a product that may or may not sell sufficient units to be subject to income tax unless I register my exemption through international tax treaty.  It's quite simple really.  Even I can do the maths and my lifelong number blindness does not pose a problem.  I can tell the difference between 30% tax and 0% tax.  One has a 3 at the front and costs me roughly a third of anything I bring in.  The other has been taken care of by my government because I pay tax here too.  Except I won't on this because anything I earn on this particular title is going straight to charity and HMRC don't need to know about it.

You hear that?  They don't need to know!  It's going to charity therefore it only touches my account to bounce straight back out again and into someone else's, so they don't even waste time on processing forms that are completely unnecessary.  They have a slogan too - "Tax doesn't have to be taxing" - and they hold to that.  Sorting out our taxes in the UK is a plain English simple process that doesn't cause hideous cranial pain before even a box is ticked.

I really don't know how US citizens cope with filing their taxes when the paperwork is written in such a way that someone with a degree in English from a British red brick university can make neither head nor tail of it.  Maybe they don't.  I haven't really asked.  Maybe the IRS brings in millions of extra revenue because no-one understands the forms.  Maybe I'm just unfamiliar with the system in question and by the tenth time I've gone through it all, I'll do so without painkillers on standby.  I'll certainly be more inclined to laugh when I hear a comment like "relax, we're not the IRS."

HMRC, all is forgiven.  I got quite annoyed with your sister, DWP not long ago, but I still understood everything she said.  If I could do this through you, believe me, I would because when I spoke to you the other week you couldn't have been more helpful and clear.  Now if you could only tell your cousin how to do it...