Subsistence - do I need receipts?

[maxima]

ehrm... i dunno. so far i am with giant and they asking for receipts. their allowance is 15 per day if you are out for 10hrs+.... I assumed it is the same for own Ltd...

btw - I asked few more guys. Noone keeps receipts. They say - we dont give a monkey. Probably you will get screwed if you get investigated. but we found it to be unlikely event.

so general attitude amongst seasoned contractors I met so far - take as much as you can and if you get caught pay it later.. if else....

hmmmm.... I might like it.

[kirk]

ehrm... i dunno. so far i am with giant and they asking for receipts. their allowance is 15 per day if you are out for 10hrs+.... I assumed it is the same for own Ltd...

btw - I asked few more guys. Noone keeps receipts. They say - we dont give a monkey. Probably you will get screwed if you get investigated. but we found it to be unlikely event.

so general attitude amongst seasoned contractors I met so far - take as much as you can and if you get caught pay it later.. if else....

hmmmm.... I might like it.

I only wish I had that confidence; I don't think I could sleep at night

[dmini]

Those "expenses" are one of the reasons Gordon is clamping down - and you should have had an email from Giant telling you that you can claim nowt after April - unless you move to one of their "limited companies" specially set up for you.
Most seasoned contractors I know keep receipts. Put it like this, if you claim 7.5k expenses (£15 a day) & mileage etc for each year, and cannot prove it if investigated, then you could be done literally for thousands in back tax. HMRC will go back 5 or 6 years! If say you were on 40% tax band that would be 4k tax on your expenses alone - not taking into account mileage you can't prove. I wouldn't want to end up with a tax bill of 30k. Do you want to take that risk?
The way I look at it- what a permie employer would have allowed in expenses back in the olden days - that is what is generally allowable. A number of people here have had hmrc investigations, and can confirm that, I think. There are a few perks which are extra - most have been discussed recently in other threads on here.

[Ardesco]

Don't forget that they can also do you for fraud which can result in a jail term of up to 15 years...

Most seasoned contractors I know don't even bother with subsistence because they earn enough that a couple of quid per day doesn't really matter and 95% of the time you never use it anyway.

[dmini]

Don't forget that they can also do you for fraud which can result in a jail term of up to 15 years...

Most seasoned contractors I know don't even bother with subsistence because they earn enough that a couple of quid per day doesn't really matter and 95% of the time you never use it anyway.

I agree - I'm claiming at the moment cos I am away from home during the week, but once I get back to working closer to home, I generally won't claim lunch or anything - I take food from home which is far cheaper!

[Bluebird]

I thiught the HMRC take on lunch was that it doesn't matter where you live or work you need lunch therefore it's a personal expense that cannot be off-set against tax.

Evening meal is different in that if your job takes you away from home you can claim re-imbursement of expenses that "would not normally be incurred "

[pisces]

I thought meal expenses was £3 per day

[Ardesco]

Prosecution: "Me'lud, the prosecution belives that the defendant was claiming £3 a day for the past 7 years that he was not entitled to claim and he has no receipts to back it up."

Defendant: "but I thought I could...."

Judge: "Guilty as sin!!!!!"