A competent professional is someone with relevant qualifications or experience, or both, in the specific field of science or technology the project sits in. The concept anchors the whole R&D definition: work qualifies where it seeks to resolve uncertainty that a competent professional in the field could not readily resolve, so every claim needs at least one identifiable person against whose knowledge that test is applied.
What the role actually involves
The competent professional’s job in a claim is to identify the scientific or technological uncertainties and explain why a professional working in the field could not readily resolve them. That means describing what was already known or deducible in the field, why the project’s problems went beyond it, and what had to be worked out through the R&D itself. This is a technical judgement, not a tax one, which is why it has to come from your team rather than your adviser: we shape and test the account, but the expertise it rests on is the company’s.
The field matters. Competence is judged in the specific field of the uncertainty, so a highly experienced software architect is not a competent professional on a fermentation problem, and vice versa. Projects that span disciplines often need more than one professional’s input for the claim to hold together.
Do they need formal qualifications?
Formal academic qualifications are not a strict legal requirement, and there is no definition to measure yourself against: the Guidelines that carry the statutory meaning of R&D use the term without defining it, and HMRC’s guidelines for compliance describe a competent professional as someone suitably qualified or experienced in the field. In fast-moving fields deep practical experience can be exactly what competence looks like. But the bar HMRC sets is higher than time served. Its guidance expects three things together: knowledge of the relevant scientific or technological principles, awareness of the current state of knowledge in the field as a whole, and accumulated experience with a track record — and it warns in terms that having worked in a field, or having an intelligent interest in it, does not by itself make someone a competent professional. Strong credentials make all three easier to evidence, which matters, because the account has to survive questioning: HMRC checked around one in six claims in 2023-24, its latest published figure.
They do not have to be your employee. HMRC’s guidelines for compliance say a competent professional may work for your company or may not, and the approach they recommend is to get the opinion of a competent professional in the field — often, they note, someone suitable already works on the project. A retained consultant, a fractional CTO or a specialist brought in for the work can hold the role, provided the attributes are there and the person was genuinely working in the field and on this project. It does not stretch to your claims adviser, though: competence is judged in the project’s field of science or technology, and R&D tax is not that field.
The Additional Information Form’s project questions are built around this judgement — HMRC’s guidance on answering the uncertainties question asks why a competent professional in the field could not readily resolve them — so identify yours early, before drafting starts rather than after. A claim written first and attributed to a professional afterwards tends to read that way.
Where to go next
The competent professional test is one strand of the statutory definition; our guide to what counts as qualifying R&D covers the rest, including the advance and uncertainty tests the professional’s account has to support. If you are unsure whether anyone in your team fits the description, that is worth resolving before a claim is prepared, and we will give you a straight answer.
Sources
- Guidelines on the meaning of R&D for tax purposes — the definition the competent professional test sits inside.
- GfC3: the importance of a competent professional — HMRC’s description of a competent professional, the three attributes it expects, its warning about the bar, and that the professional may or may not work for your company.
- GfC3: Recommended approach to claims and record keeping (part 5) — HMRC’s recommendation to get the opinion of a competent professional in the field, often someone already working on the project.
- Submit detailed information before you claim — the AIF’s project questions the professional’s account has to answer.
This page describes the rules as they stood at the review date above, as general information rather than advice on your circumstances. For how that distinction works, see our terms; for an answer on your own facts, talk to us.