Wealth & finance International - Wealth & Money Management Awards 2017

Wealth & Money Management Awards 2017 4 Best Tax Reclamation Services Firm 2017 Goal Group is the global leader in withholding tax reclamation and securities class actions recovery services. Vicky Dean talks us through the firm and the range of services it provides in this area. Company: Goal Group Limited Contact: Vicky Dean Contact Email: [email protected] Address: Ground floor, 69 Park Lane, Croydon, CR9 1BG, UK Phone: +44 (0) 208 760 7130 Established in 1989, Goal is headquartered in London with an expanding footprint across the US and Asia Pacific, where each office is staffed by local tax, legal and securities experts. Goal delivers its services globally through a network of offices in San Francisco, Philadelphia, Melbourne, New York and Hong Kong, and through strategic partnerships. Vicky discusses the firm’s service offering in more detail and explains how it works to ensure excellence for its global clients. “Reclaiming withholding tax on cross-border securities income continues to represent a huge opportunity for investors, fund managers and custodians across the world. Goal is dedicated to providing outstanding services in withholding tax reclamation and as evidence of this, our client services have continuously received ratings of “very satisfied” or higher. Of all tax reclaims received over the last 12 months 100% were reconciled, processed and paid to clients within ISO9001:2008 quality standards. “Additionally, we have also developed a system called Accelerator which has been designed to process client data that relates to global securities class actions. It provides calculations on recognised losses where clients may have a claim. With Accelerator, financial services institutions and the investment management community benefit from an automated process for securities class actions recoveries. This allows them to meet their fiduciary duties and maximise returns for their clients with great ease. “As the global leader in withholding tax reclamation services, Goal Group is dedicated to helping the world’s largest financial institutions maximise investor returns. Our market-leading proprietary software and systems provide the highest levels of data security and process automation, offering investors an efficient and cost-effective way to reclaim tax on cross-border dividend income and participate in securities class actions. Goal Global Recoveries has an outstanding track record of obtaining compensation and to date has recovered hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation for its clients.” This space is particularly lucrative, as over £25 billion of withholding tax is deducted globally and it is estimated that around a quarter of reclaimable withholding tax still lies unrecovered each year, which in 2015 amounted to losses of USD 18.9bn. Goal’s products and services facilitate reclaiming a significant proportion of this. This opportunity becomes yet more significant in light of major increases in market capitalisation, rising proportions of portfolios devoted to cross-border investments, and increasing numbers of companies paying dividends. Some investors and advisors still believe that the reclamation process is so complex and labour-intensive that this outweighs the advantages, but, with the right technology and support, this is simply not true. Global Tax Reclamation Solution (GTRS) is Goal’s licensed software for cross-border withholding tax reclaims. Launched in 1992 and continually enhanced and updated, it helps our clients obtain maximum returns as efficiently as possible. As a truly global solution, it incorporates tax treaty information for all jurisdictions and supports all client and stock types. The application reclaims over-withheld tax on cross-border securities income by automating the calculation, batching reclaims and producing and populating the required forms and letters to create a complete reclaim package. GTRS is a modular system that allows the automation of as much of the tax reclamation process as required as well as including advanced reporting capabilities. It can be seamlessly integrated with our clients’ back office systems to enable automatic data imports. Goal also offers an extensive suite of reports in a variety of formats to help clients track and monitor the status of their reclaims throughout their lifecycle. Report content can be tailored to meet clients’ specific requirements. Looking ahead, Goal are keen to continue developing this innovative solution to build upon its current success, as Vicky is proud to conclude. WM170002