From £400k to £535k per Claim
- Peak claim: £535k
- Total recovered: £1.2m
- HMRC challenges: None to date
The Client
The business develops and operates a proprietary software platform within the insurance sector, enabling brokers and partners to quote, price, and manage policies through a single integrated system. Its engineering teams work across distributed systems, integrations, and evolving product architecture, with a strong focus on performance, reliability, and real-time pricing and transaction workflows.
Innovation was embedded within iterative development cycles, rather than defined as discrete R&D projects.
The Challenge
The issue was not a lack of innovation, but a mismatch between how software development is understood internally and how R&D is defined under legislation.
Engineering teams describe their work in terms of features, releases, and incremental improvements. R&D legislation, however, focuses on technical uncertainty—whether a solution was readily deducible and whether resolving it required more than routine application of existing knowledge.
As a result, qualifying activity was under-identified. Work involving genuine technical uncertainty—such as complex integrations, architectural evolution, and performance constraints—was often treated as routine development.
At the same time, preparing claims placed a burden on senior developers, requiring them to retrospectively translate their work into a format that did not reflect how they actually operated.
The development itself was not the problem.
The interpretation was.
Our Approach
We implemented a structured framework to align software development activity with the legislative definition of R&D, without disrupting engineering workflows.
Development work was reframed through the lens of technical uncertainty, focusing on where existing knowledge had been extended rather than what had been built. This allowed routine-looking work to be assessed against the correct criteria.
We then removed reliance on engineers to produce documentation, extracting qualifying activity through structured technical discussions and analysis of system changes.
Over time, this became a repeatable model. As new development occurred, qualifying activity was captured consistently, allowing claims to evolve alongside the business.
The development work did not change.
The classification did.
The Result
The impact was both immediate and cumulative. Initial claims increased from approximately £400k, with subsequent claims reaching £535k at peak. Total value recovered exceeded £1.2m.
Internal burden reduced significantly, with engineering teams no longer required to support the claims process in detail.
All claims were prepared to withstand scrutiny from the outset, and none have been challenged.
Strategic Impact
As the framework became embedded, the company developed a clearer understanding of how its technical work aligned with R&D criteria. This improved confidence across both engineering and finance functions.
R&D claims became a structured and repeatable component of the company’s financial model, scaling alongside its engineering capability without additional internal effort.
In software businesses, continuous development often appears routine.
Under R&D legislation, it often isn’t.
The difference lies in how that work is understood.
If your team is spending too much time supporting your R&D claim, we should talk.
Sign up to our Newsletter
Stay ahead with the latest R&D tax insights, funding updates, and innovation trends — straight to your inbox.
