Hi all,
I have posted the below on another forum but have not really got anywhere.
The gist of it, I contracted last year as a self employed person, working as a sole trader.
This year for obvious reasons I have changed to a limited company.
I hope in a year or two i will not need tax credits but for now there a life line.
So can I claim working hours as a sole trader and as a ltd when not in a contract? E.G. The finding the contract bit... if so what do we think the tax credits office will officially call the "finding bit", marketing perhaps??
Many thanks in advance.
I have posted the below on another forum but have not really got anywhere.
The gist of it, I contracted last year as a self employed person, working as a sole trader.
This year for obvious reasons I have changed to a limited company.
I hope in a year or two i will not need tax credits but for now there a life line.
So can I claim working hours as a sole trader and as a ltd when not in a contract? E.G. The finding the contract bit... if so what do we think the tax credits office will officially call the "finding bit", marketing perhaps??
Many thanks in advance.
Hi all,
I have searched for an answer on this but I think my circumstances are a little unusual (I think).
I was recently “randomly” investigated for working/tax credits, I sent in all the information that I thought was appropriate to prove everything they asked, despite finding some questions irrelevant.
The end result is they have stopped the working element of our tax credits award so I now have to go through the process again to insure we get it back and do not have to pay back last years “working” award.
Our circumstances are as follows.
My partner works 16 hours a week, they is PAYE and the tax credit office have no problem with this.
I am self-employed and work 10+ hours a week.
I have been self-employed since May 2013, my accountant has not finalised my 2013/14 books yet as we are still awaiting an invoice to be paid before shutting the company down (sole trader). I changed to a limited company in May 2014.
I am a contract “project manager”, this means my time is spent primarily looking for work (certainly in the early years of building contacts) followed by working flat out for a three month period when I obtain a contract.
Obviously it is very easy to prove I am working when I have a contract, however when I am not working a contract I spend a lot of time looking for the next, by means of posting my CV on job sites (weekly to keep at the top of the list), taking calls from recruiters who find me (primarily it appears recruiters find you and applying for posted jobs has minimal results), changing CV to suit roles, preparing for interviews, travelling to interviews etc.
So what I am scared of is I have not kept a diary thus far, in my ignorance no one told me to so how do I prove to tax credits I have been working when I was not in a contract, and what explanation\activity do I use. I guess I can make a diary retrospectively but it will be very generic, such as posted CV on job boards, waited for phone to ring, if interview obtained prepared, etc…
I originally supplied the tax credit office with a copy of my NI payments to date supplied by HMRC and a brief overview of my business model, which obviously was not sufficient.
I have spoken to the tax credit office and the advisor was vague (to an untrained ear like myself) but did keep mentioning marketing and a letter from my accountant.
As everyone I work for is in theory a “client” is all the time I spend finding that “client” to secure a contract of work classed as marketing?? Would that be the correct tax credit “office” wording?
What I guess I am asking is will a retrospective created generic diary primarily mentioning “marketing activity” be sufficient (if backed up with a letter from my accountant) for the time I am not in a contract?? Or is it more complicated than that??
Many thanks in advance for your help.
PS, when I was working a contract I was doing 50 hour weeks, I never mentioned this to the tax credit office as I assumed as long as I was working more than my stated quota of 10 they would be happy??
I have searched for an answer on this but I think my circumstances are a little unusual (I think).
I was recently “randomly” investigated for working/tax credits, I sent in all the information that I thought was appropriate to prove everything they asked, despite finding some questions irrelevant.
The end result is they have stopped the working element of our tax credits award so I now have to go through the process again to insure we get it back and do not have to pay back last years “working” award.
Our circumstances are as follows.
My partner works 16 hours a week, they is PAYE and the tax credit office have no problem with this.
I am self-employed and work 10+ hours a week.
I have been self-employed since May 2013, my accountant has not finalised my 2013/14 books yet as we are still awaiting an invoice to be paid before shutting the company down (sole trader). I changed to a limited company in May 2014.
I am a contract “project manager”, this means my time is spent primarily looking for work (certainly in the early years of building contacts) followed by working flat out for a three month period when I obtain a contract.
Obviously it is very easy to prove I am working when I have a contract, however when I am not working a contract I spend a lot of time looking for the next, by means of posting my CV on job sites (weekly to keep at the top of the list), taking calls from recruiters who find me (primarily it appears recruiters find you and applying for posted jobs has minimal results), changing CV to suit roles, preparing for interviews, travelling to interviews etc.
So what I am scared of is I have not kept a diary thus far, in my ignorance no one told me to so how do I prove to tax credits I have been working when I was not in a contract, and what explanation\activity do I use. I guess I can make a diary retrospectively but it will be very generic, such as posted CV on job boards, waited for phone to ring, if interview obtained prepared, etc…
I originally supplied the tax credit office with a copy of my NI payments to date supplied by HMRC and a brief overview of my business model, which obviously was not sufficient.
I have spoken to the tax credit office and the advisor was vague (to an untrained ear like myself) but did keep mentioning marketing and a letter from my accountant.
As everyone I work for is in theory a “client” is all the time I spend finding that “client” to secure a contract of work classed as marketing?? Would that be the correct tax credit “office” wording?
What I guess I am asking is will a retrospective created generic diary primarily mentioning “marketing activity” be sufficient (if backed up with a letter from my accountant) for the time I am not in a contract?? Or is it more complicated than that??
Many thanks in advance for your help.
PS, when I was working a contract I was doing 50 hour weeks, I never mentioned this to the tax credit office as I assumed as long as I was working more than my stated quota of 10 they would be happy??
Comment