Davenport Lyons hires former Head of Tax at Howard Kennedy

Roger Bindschedler has joined Davenport Lyons as a tax partner.

Roger joined Customs and Excise in 1988.  There he worked in various posts, including being a VAT Officer for a few years, and studied law in his spare time before being seconded to Customs and Excise’s Solicitors Office in 1995.  Roger was awarded a distinction in the LPC before obtaining a training contract with Customs and Excise.  He qualified in February 1998 and completed an MA in “Tax: Avoidance and Evasion” in September 1998.

In September 1998 Roger moved from Customs and Excise to KPMG for three years.  There he worked in the European Customs Practice and the Indirect Tax Practice advising on the VAT liability of various arrangements including cross border leases, structuring transactions to minimise the true cost of VAT.  Clients included GE, GM, Fleetlease, Singer and Friedlander plc, Fortis Bank, Hitachi Credit plc; ING Leasing; Dresdner and Kleinwort Benson.

Roger then spent four years (September 2001 to January 2006) in Richards Butler’s tax team.  Here he concentrated on VAT, Stamp Duty, employee incentive schemes, sales of business and business assets and MBOs before being offered partnership at West End property firm, Howard Kennedy.

As Howard Kennedy’s head of tax Roger was increasingly involved in premium tax structuring to minimise the tax burden on businesses.  SDLT mitigation was a fertile ground, as was the use of off-shore structures to enable businesses to operate in low tax environments.

When he joined Davenport Lyons in December 2008, Roger brought a wide experience of business structuring and tax mitigation expertise to complement the firm’s existing Tax and Trusts offering.  Roger balances the commercial and tax drivers in structuring transactions and business to suit clients’ longer term needs.

Roger is member of the VAT Practitioner’s Group and a committee member of the Stamp Taxes Practitioners Group.