TS Eliot may well have said 'April is the cruellest month' but this year many advisers will begin April with the thought that they - and their clients - have got away lightly.

With the Budget on March 3 and Tax Day following on March 23, many people had been preparing for a series of proposed changes and updates to the UK's antiquated, largely paper-based, tax system.

There were several areas of potential change. For many years, financial planners have called for an overhaul of inheritance tax, citing the fact many of the allowances, reliefs and thresholds were set in the 1980s - before house prices increased exponentially and pushed many more Britons into the 'wealthy' bracket for IHT purposes.

Capital gains tax had also been earmarked for reform - not least bringing the rates more into line with income tax, or cutting the current relief - moves that had led some financial planners to call this a 'wealth tax by the back door'.

And there was the perennial question of pensions relief, which some commentators had once again warned was ripe for HM Revenue & Customs' plucking.

But Chancellor Rishi Sunak seems to have pulled his punches on Tuesday (March 23), with very limited real change to IHT other than an administrative clean up, no changes announced to CGT, and the only whiff of pensions tax reform arriving in the shape of a review to come over anomalies that exist in scheme rules.

That said, there are some notable updates to the tax system that tax advisers and their clients might need to grapple with - not just this month, nor in April alone, but as part of long-term financial planning.

This mini-guide, which qualifies for an estimated 50 minutes' worth of structured CPD, will outline the reasons and the economic rationale for tax day, explain the changes to IHT and what might be in store for pensions as hinted at by the documents, and unpick some of the other proposals that could affect clients.

simoney.kyriakou@ft.com

Contributors include: Steven Cameron, pensions policy director at Aegon; Jesse Norman MP, financial secretary to the Treasury; Neil Jones, tax and wealth specialist at Canada Life; Rachael Griffin, tax and financial planning specialist at Quilter; George Bull, senior tax partner at RSM; Andrew Dixon, head of wealth planning at Kleinwort Hambros; Edward Grant, director responsible for professional development at St James's Place; HM Revenue & Customs; Jenny Cutts, partner at Wedlake Bell.