It is almost mid February and well past the end of January deadline for having completed your tax returns.

Being slightly obsessive compulsive and not wanting to ruin Christmas and the new year by having to sort through receipts and add up expenses, I usually get my tax sorted in May, eight months before it is strictly necessary.

Thomas prefers to leave it all until the very last minute and spends the festive period surrounded by piles of receipts, trying to remember what they were all for.

This year is no different, though he has a new excuse for his general leave everything to the last minuteness. He read in a book, given to him for Christmas, that if you submit your tax returns at the eleventh hour, they are less likely to be intensely scrutinised by the tax man.

This is because he, he being a large army of tax inspectors, will be inundated by so many last-minute returns, which he has to process, and will not have time to worry about whether the squeezy Early Learning Centre paints you bought for £3.99 were strictly for business purposes.

Whoever wrote the book was wrong.

While my tax bill for the year ending April 2002 landed on the doormat, so too did a letter for Thomas informing him the tax man wished to investigate the return he had only just submitted.

"I should have listened to Ralph (our accountant)," moaned Thomas. "He told me the computer golf game CD ROM would probably not meet with their approval."

The computer golf game being the thing that keeps Thomas busy at work for much of the day, as far as a I can tell, which time-wasting pursuit he justifies on the grounds many of his would be clients play golf and, if he can perfect his game with a few rounds on his laptop, he may be able to attract them to his company, thereby increasing profits etc. etc.

That argument has never washed with me and obviously doesn't wash with the tax inspector either. He now wishes to meet with Thomas and Ralph and go through his business expenses.

Thomas left the house for above meeting, looking as if he was going to a funeral i.e. very smart and rather nervous, clutching a large carrier bag stuffed with receipts, which he hopes will provide the evidence he needs to support his tax claim.

He arrived home in buoyant mood, carrying another plastic bag from which he produced a new DVD called how to Improve your Swing - or some such fantasy golf title.

I raised my eyebrows, in what was intended to be a quizzical expression, and asked him how the meeting had gone. To which he replied that it had gone very well and did I have something in my eye?

"So he didn't disallow you the cost of your alleged business trip to Scotland, when you actually went on a golfing holiday but saw one client up there in order to make it tax deductible?" I asked.

"Not at all," beamed Thomas. "He simply asked which courses we had played and shared his experiences of playing them himself."

"So your tax return is OK?" I said.

"Well, there were a few taxis that I didn't have receipts for but apart from that everything was fine," replied Thomas.

"In fact we got on very well and I've arranged to play golf with him next week . . . "