R&D claims after the 2024 merged scheme: what actually changed
The merged R&D scheme has now applied to a full year of UK startup accounting periods. The headline change — one rate for everyone — masks several detail changes that have already cost founders real money. Here's what to fix in your next claim.
The single biggest behavioural change: subcontracted R&D now follows the decision-maker, not the doer. If you commissioned and directed the work, you claim it — not your dev agency.
R&D-intensive status (≥30% of total expenditure on qualifying R&D) is worth defending — it preserves the 86% enhanced deduction and 14.5% cash credit rate. The threshold drops to 30% for APs starting on or after 1 April 2024 (down from the original 40%).
Pre-notification trips up first-time claimants. You must notify HMRC of your intention to claim within 6 months of the end of the accounting period. Miss it and the whole claim is invalid.
Overseas costs: largely out, unless you can document why the work couldn't physically, legally, or socially be done in the UK.
“The merged scheme isn't simpler — it's differently complicated. Most founders are still claiming as if it's 2023.”
Sources
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