We are talking to several firm owners this week who all have the same question, phrased slightly differently: can we get this signed and completed before the Chancellor stands up on 28 October? None of them are asking because their deal is actually ready to complete two days faster than planned. They are asking because they are frightened of a number changing underneath them, and the honest answer is more useful than the reassuring one.
Start with what is fact, not forecast. Business Asset Disposal Relief (BADR) — the relief most sellers of accountancy and legal practices rely on to reduce the Capital Gains Tax charged on a qualifying sale — currently charges 18% on qualifying gains for disposals made on or after 6 April 2026, up to a lifetime limit of £1,000,000 of gains per individual, as published on GOV.UK. That is already a sharp rise: the rate was 10% for years, rose to 14% on 6 April 2025, and rose again to today's 18% on 6 April 2026. In under two years, the relief has lost most of what made it worth claiming in the first place against the main 24% CGT rate.
What is not confirmed is any further change at this specific Budget. We have not found a single named government source committing to touch BADR again on 28 October. What we have found is real, attributed speculation about something bigger: a reform floated and reportedly endorsed by Wes Streeting that would align Capital Gains Tax with income tax bands — 20%, 40% and 45% depending on total income — rather than today's flatter rates, with some versions of the idea removing reliefs like BADR entirely. The Centre for the Analysis of Taxation has put the revenue from full alignment at roughly £14 billion a year, which is the kind of number that keeps an idea alive in Treasury planning even when nothing is announced. The economist Andy Haldane has separately warned against treating Capital Gains Tax as a reliable "cash cow", pointing out that receipts from it are notoriously volatile. Both sides of that argument are live going into the 28th. Neither is a confirmed policy.
The pressure firm sellers feel right now is not really about BADR specifically. It is about the fact that every Budget since late 2024 has moved this relief, and sellers have learned, correctly, that a Budget is when the rules change. The 2026/27 rate rise to 18% did not arrive as a surprise cut buried in a footnote; it was flagged well in advance, took effect on a fixed date, and anyone who completed a sale the week before kept the old rate while anyone who completed the week after paid more on an identical deal. That lived experience, repeated twice now, is why a seller mid-process treats 28 October as a hard deadline worth bending a transaction timetable around, even without a specific announcement to point to.
This is the part sellers most often get backwards, and it matters more than the headline rate itself. Ordinarily, an unconditional contract fixes the date of disposal — and therefore which year's tax rules apply — at the point of signature, not at completion. On paper, that sounds like the answer: sign the contract before 28 October, and you are done, regardless of what the Budget says.
In practice, HMRC's anti-forestalling rules exist precisely to stop that move when it is the only reason for the timing. The rules re-date the disposal to the actual completion date, overriding the earlier contract date, where the parties are connected, or where a main purpose of signing when you did was to secure the lower rate and there was no genuine commercial reason for that particular timing. A real, arm's-length sale that happens to sign before the deadline for ordinary commercial reasons is not caught by this. A contract rushed through purely to beat the calendar, with no other explanation for why it landed on that date, is exactly the pattern the rule was written to catch — and it puts the burden on the seller to explain the timing if HMRC asks.
Take a seller with a £2,000,000 qualifying gain who has not previously used any BADR lifetime limit. Under today's confirmed rules, £1,000,000 of that gain is taxed at the 18% BADR rate (£180,000) and the remaining £1,000,000 at the main 24% rate (£240,000), for a total Capital Gains Tax bill of £420,000. That is the real, current-law number, and it is already £140,000 higher than the same deal would have cost at the old 10% BADR rate.
Now compare that with the scenario being floated, not announced: full alignment of Capital Gains Tax with income tax rates, with BADR withdrawn. Analysis built around that scenario has put the bill on the same £2,000,000 gain as high as £900,000, roughly double today's figure, because the gain would then be taxed at up to 40% or 45% with no relief at all. The gap between those two outcomes — £420,000 against £900,000 — is the entire reason the phone has been ringing. It is also, precisely because nothing is confirmed, not a number anyone should treat as the planning basis for a transaction yet. It is a reason to be ready, not a reason to sign something badly drafted by Friday.
If your deal was already on course to complete in October for ordinary commercial reasons — the diligence is done, funding is in place, the parties are simply ready — then there is nothing wrong with holding that date, and no reason to apologise for it. The risk sits entirely with deals being artificially compressed: heads of terms rushed before proper due diligence, warranties thinned out to save a week, or a buyer's price squeezed down because a seller has signalled they must complete by a fixed date regardless of terms. A buyer who senses panic will price it in. Our note on heads of terms and exclusivity covers why the first draft you sign shapes everything that follows, Budget or no Budget.
None of this is a reason to drift, either. Our guide to tax when you sell your practice sets out how BADR, Capital Gains Tax and earn-out structures interact in detail, and it is worth having that conversation with your adviser this week regardless of what 28 October brings. The Budget is a real date on a real calendar. It is not, on its own, a reason to sign a deal you have not had time to check.
Nobody outside the Treasury knows, and nothing to that effect has been confirmed. What is real is the direction of travel: the relief has already been squeezed twice, from 10% to 14% in April 2025 and to 18% in April 2026, and there is live, attributed speculation about aligning capital gains tax with income tax bands entirely, which some versions of the proposal would do by removing the relief altogether. Treat it as a live risk to plan around, not a confirmed change to react to.
Not automatically. Ordinarily an unconditional contract fixes the disposal date, and therefore the tax rate, at signature rather than completion. But anti-forestalling rules override that if the main purpose of signing early was to grab the lower rate and there was no genuine commercial reason for the timing. A real, arm's-length sale signed for ordinary commercial reasons is not caught. A contract rushed through purely to beat a deadline is exactly the fact pattern HMRC's anti-forestalling rules were written to catch.
As confirmed on GOV.UK, Business Asset Disposal Relief charges 18% on qualifying gains for disposals made on or after 6 April 2026, up to a lifetime limit of £1,000,000 of gains per individual. That limit is cumulative across your lifetime, not reset each year, so a seller who has used part of it on an earlier disposal only has the remaining balance to set against this one. The rate has climbed steeply to get here — it was 10% until April 2025, then 14% for a single tax year, and now 18% — so the relief is worth far less against the main 24% rate than it was even two years ago, and qualifying for it at all still depends on meeting the ownership and employment conditions well before completion.
Get your adviser to confirm, in writing, exactly where completion mechanics currently sit and what genuinely drives your timetable, separate from the Budget date. If a real commercial reason already has you on course to complete in October, keep going and document why. If the only reason to rush is the date on the calendar, slow down, get the deal right, and plan for either outcome rather than risking a forced, under-negotiated sale to beat a headline that may not even apply to you.
Sources: the 18% Business Asset Disposal Relief rate for disposals on or after 6 April 2026, and the £1,000,000 lifetime limit, are published on GOV.UK. The 28 October 2026 Autumn Budget date was confirmed by the Chancellor, John Healey. Speculation about aligning Capital Gains Tax with income tax bands, including the reported position of Wes Streeting, the Centre for the Analysis of Taxation's revenue estimate and economist Andy Haldane's caution on volatile receipts, is reported in coverage of the run-up to the Budget. Anti-forestalling treatment of contracts signed ahead of a BADR rate change is a long-standing feature of how disposal dates are tested under the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992.
This article is general market commentary about Capital Gains Tax and Business Asset Disposal Relief as they affect the timing of UK professional-services firm sales. It is not tax, legal or investment advice, and Founder Capital LLP is not authorised or regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Nothing here is an offer or invitation to invest; any investment opportunities we reference are available only to professional investors, certified high-net-worth individuals and self-certified sophisticated investors, are not open to retail investors, and capital is at risk and returns are not guaranteed. Budget speculation is exactly that until the Chancellor sits down on 28 October — please take specific, current tax and legal advice before changing a completion date on the strength of anything written here.
