Month: May 2012

Self Assessment Tips for Subcontractors

The construction industry has a large number of self employed subcontractors covering most trades, they often work for a variety of Contractors on multiple sites, which generally means that each year they need help with their self assessment returns.

Here are some suggestions to help:

1. If you are paid net of deduction makesure you have a complete set of Payment Deduction Statements http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/forms/cis-payment-deduction-statement.pdf these statements show how much tax has been deducted and you will be able to use these statements to reclaim that tax on your self assessment return, often the CIS deductions will mean that too much tax has been paid

2. Travel – Self employed workers claim all of their travel and motoring costs and exclude a % for private use

3. Clothing & PPE – gather together all the receipts you have for specialist clothing and PPE

4. Vehicles, Tools, Plant and Equipment – these items of expenditure may be eligible for Capital Allowances and the Annual Investment Allowance (£25,000 for 2012/13) if you have any private use then this will need to be assessed and excluded

5. Other Expenses – You will need details of Insurance, Accountancy, Materials, Bank Charges, Phones, Stationery, and anything else you spent money on

It might seem boring but collecting the information noted above could save you thousands.

steve@bicknells.net

 

Ways to Save National Insurance

I have always thought that National Insurance (NI) is a strange tax compared to PAYE because:

  1. For normal employees it isn’t cumulative its based on their earnings in a month or week (although Driectors can opt for Cumulative)
  2. It only applies between the ages of 16 and retirement
  3. Its applied at different rates to the Self Employed and there are 4 classes of NI

But the thing that seems totally bizarre to me is that for each job you have you get new NI limits, so if you had a variety of part time jobs you might not pay any National Insurance because your earnings were below the threshold in them all.

This also applys if you are Director, you get a new cumulative limit with each employer.

The current main Class 1 rates are 12% for employees and 13.8% for employers

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rates/nic.htm

If you’re employed you pay Class 1 National Insurance contributions. The rates are:

  • if you earn more than £146 a week and up to £817 a week, you pay 12 per cent of the amount you earn between £146 and £817
  • if you earn more than £817 a week, you also pay 2 per cent of all your earnings over £817

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/moneytaxandbenefits/taxes/beginnersguidetotax/nationalinsurance/introductiontonationalinsurance/dg_190048

Apart from having multiple jobs or changing jobs here are a few ways that you can save NI:

  1. Salary Sacrifice http://stevejbicknell.com/2011/10/22/salary-sacrifice-could-save-45-8-in-tax-and-ni-how-does-it-work/
  2. Special NI Holiday Schemes http://stevejbicknell.com/2011/10/15/holiday-pay-without-any-national-insurance-to-pay/
  3. Regional Employer NI Holiday – save up to £50,000 http://stevejbicknell.com/2011/10/08/reduce-your-ni-bill-by-50000/
  4. Benefits in Kind – for example Gym membership or Assets placed at the employees disposal – Tax and Class 1A NI is payable but the employee doesn’t pay NI – basically any of th brown boxes on the P11D http://stevejbicknell.com/2011/11/07/tax-free-fitness/http://stevejbicknell.com/2012/04/14/directors-loan-vs-private-use-of-company-assets/

steve@bicknells.net

Why invest in a Pension? Because of Tax Relief!

 

I have been looking at the Tax Relief impact on Pension Investments

Lets say you invest £10,000 per year of earned gross income, increasing each year by 3% for inflation and see the effect of tax relief at 40% and 20%, assuming a return on the investment of 7% (which you should get with Commercial Property Investment)

40% Tax Rate 20% Tax Rate
Year Pension No Pension % Diff Year Pension No Pension % Diff
1 £10,700 £6,252 71% 1 £10,700 £8,336 28%
2 £22,470 £12,954 73% 2 £22,470 £17,272 30%
3 £35,395 £20,131 76% 3 £35,395 £26,841 32%
4 £49,564 £27,808 78% 4 £49,564 £37,078 34%
5 £65,077 £36,013 81% 5 £65,077 £48,017 36%
6 £82,036 £44,773 83% 6 £82,036 £59,698 37%
7 £100,555 £54,119 86% 7 £100,555 £72,158 39%
8 £120,754 £64,081 88% 8 £120,754 £85,441 41%
9 £142,761 £74,692 91% 9 £142,761 £99,590 43%
10 £166,715 £85,987 94% 10 £166,715 £114,649 45%
11 £192,765 £98,000 97% 11 £192,765 £130,667 48%
12 £221,070 £110,771 100% 12 £221,070 £147,694 50%
13 £251,801 £124,337 103% 13 £251,801 £165,782 52%
14 £285,140 £138,740 106% 14 £285,140 £184,987 54%
15 £321,285 £154,024 109% 15 £321,285 £205,365 56%
16 £360,445 £170,233 112% 16 £360,445 £226,978 59%
17 £402,846 £187,416 115% 17 £402,846 £249,888 61%
18 £448,731 £205,621 118% 18 £448,731 £274,161 64%
19 £498,358 £224,901 122% 19 £498,358 £299,868 66%
20 £552,006 £245,309 125% 20 £552,006 £327,079 69%

Even when you consider:

  • Your money is locked up till you are 55
  • You pay tax when you take money out of the pension
  • You can get 25% out of the pension tax free

The difference in growth is massive

If you do salary sacrifice you can increase the tax effect by saving national insurance too.

So why aren’t more people investing in pensions?

steve@bicknells.net