About Us
Chown Dewhurst LLP1 brings together lawyers, economists and accountants to crack international tax problems. The principals are distinguished in their profession: John Chown is a founder of the Institute for Fiscal Studies while John Dewhurst is a member of the Council of the Chartered Institute of Taxation having formerly chaired their International Committee.
We have a wide range of clients, with some emphasis on financial markets and structure, but many are business families with individuals, companies and trusts in more than one country who prefer our integrated approach to having to deal with separate departments of large firms for separate aspects.
We also advise high-income-earning individuals, including entertainers and sportsmen, and executives and others moving from one country to another. We handle value added tax and other indirect taxes particularly where there is an international dimension.
We are members, and John Chown is Secretary, of the International Tax Specialist Group www.itsgnetwork.com (ITSG) which was formed to provide high quality, practical, and creative international tax advice on a worldwide basis. Each ITSG member is a recognized expert both within his own country, and internationally. Details of ITSG members are contained on its web site.
We therefore have within our own office and through our connections, access to a range of talent amongst people accustomed to working together, while being capable of operating independently without the support of a large organisation. The people the client meets will actually be handling most of the work, delegating and bringing in others only when appropriate. This is an efficient and cost-effective approach to professional advice. We believe we are good at tackling problems which are often very different from what the client expects, and at finding solutions which are specific to the client and unaggressive to the tax authorities of the countries concerned. We do not develop or use marketed `schemes', but prefer to start with a problem and look for a solution.
1 The business was founded as J F Chown & Company Limited in 1962 and was reorganised into the then newly available form of a limited liability partnership in 2001.
