KPMG's Japan Practice in Tax

As more and more companies operate in global markets, the demand for tax professionals with an international outlook has increased greatly. KPMG’s global network is at the forefront of meeting this demand, and KPMG in the UK’s Japan Practice in Tax focuses on assisting the UK firm’s Japanese clients on the wide range of issues that can affect their European operations.

  • Michio Ando

    • Job title: Senior Manager, Japan Practice, Tax & People Services
    • Degree: BSc Economics
    • University attended: Bath University

    The brief

    A Japanese company in the transport industry asked KPMG in the UK to review its new performance-based reward scheme and organisational structure across Europe.

    Our brief was to provide professional advice concerning the tax impact of the new reward scheme, and the legal implications in different countries of making changes to the existing pay structure. We were also asked to analyse each role across the company’s European operations to enable effective introduction of the scheme.

    The new reward scheme was being launched globally, and the European review had to meet the deadline set by the company’s HQ in Tokyo. Working to a tight timescale was one of the critical aspects of the project.

    How we did it

    We quickly formed a project team comprising members from various areas of Tax and People Services from the UK firm, and other member firms across Europe. The team was designed to incorporate multi-lingual, as well as multi-disciplinary, capabilities to enable communication with the client’s European offices.

    Michio, a Senior Manager in KPMG's Japan Practice team, led the day-to-day management of the project. He provided technical advice concerning the UK tax treatment of the performance-based reward scheme, as well as co-ordinating the multi-disciplinary team that included people from Executive Compensation in the UK and International Executive Services from KPMG in Germany.

    The project involved frequent European travel for the team members, which meant logistics was an important consideration. And logistics became a major headache when French air traffic control workers went on industrial action during the project!

    Another key element of Michio’s work was providing support to the Japanese management at the company’s European HQ in London. By explaining the salient issues in their own language, the client’s appreciation of our work was greatly enhanced.

    As Lead Project Director, Minaho took overall responsibility for the project. Supported by Michio, she monitored the progress for various workstreams; ensuring deadlines were met by each specialist team. Minaho also held status report meetings and conference calls with the company’s HQ at key stages of the project, soliciting comments as the project moved forward. Through regular communication and feedback, we were able to reinforce the message that we were working together with the client. We made any necessary adjustments during the project and ultimately met and exceeded their expectations.

    Results

    We delivered our final report on time despite a challenging schedule. Our recommendations were put into effect immediately as the new reward scheme was rolled out across the company’s European network. The project was well received by the client, who felt that it laid the foundations for a comprehensive review of its European human capital strategy. We subsequently began discussions regarding remuneration structure review and personnel evaluation policy analysis.

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