Moving from Umbrella to Ltd Co

**Alan @ BroomeAffinity** · 21 October 2008, 14:27

1.) No you don't need to use an accountant on a monthly basis - although the fact that you need to ask the question may suggest you consider it. Remember that if you use an accountant to set up the company then yuo should be in an optimised tax position and saving money from the get-go and therefore it really is worth it.

2.) Theoretically thats OK but does your spouse have other income? Would he/she be better as a shareholder? Again, an accountant can help you out.

3.) Its not normally a problem to use your home as a business address but again an accountant can help. You can normally register your company at their address. And yes, if you are working from home then you claim a portion of your household expenses as business expense. What proportion is dependent on a number of factors: number of rooms in house, extent to which home is used for business etc.

HTH

**TykeMerc** · 21 October 2008, 14:53

Originally posted by pleomax View Post

I am going to go the Ltd co route but i have a couple of questions that i hope the experts can help with please?

1. Do you need to use and accountant on a by Monthly basis?
2. Could your spouse do your day to day books and just pay for them to be
ratified at year end? (Tax savings there?)

3. Registered business address? What if your mortgage paperwork states taht
you cant? (Did i read some where that you could claim a portion of house
hold expenses for business use?)

1. Not at all, so long as you're confident that you've set things up right, it's best to get professional advice initially.
2. Yes, perfectly reasonable
3. If the mortgage paperwork is explicit then don't risk it as your registered address, you can always ask a friend or family member or your accountant to use their address. You can of course use a different mailing address and there's nothing that states that your office has to be at the registered business address, if that happens to be your home then you can charge some expenses to your business. Expenses amount you should ask an accountant as they know what's typically acceptable.

**pleomax** · 21 October 2008, 15:15

Originally posted by Just1morethen View Post

1.) 2.) Theoretically thats OK but does your spouse have other income? Would he/she be better as a shareholder? Again, an accountant can help you out.

She dosent work and has a financial back ground prior to being a home maker. I was thinking all above board that she could do the day to day paperwork and gat paid a sensible wage for the time spent doing it.

Would Hector get upset by this? I am inside IR35 it seems by the way.

Pleomax.

**Beefy198** · 21 October 2008, 19:00

Out of interest what are your issues with them? Then maybe we can play the fun game "guess the brolly"

**pleomax** · 21 October 2008, 20:34

I had to chase them where a payment was and after two days they come back and said my timesheet had not been received by the agency. This was 16 days after i had entered the info on their web portal.
I would have expected them to be all over them like a rash as i am sure the brolly wants it money?

Pleomax

**Beefy198** · 21 October 2008, 21:29

Probably but with a couple of hundred or thousand other contractors on the books you could be bottom of the food chain.....

Edit: Actually, maybe I'm being a little rash - was this a client or agency's system that you had to enter your hours in? If so, I suppose it could be difficult for them out of all the people on their books to know that you DID work that week.

Would be interesting either way.

**pleomax** · 21 October 2008, 21:32

...The point I was trying to make.

If my company I could have one person who has only one task of getting the money in on time and dealing with stupid issues.

Trouble is my contracts all seem to fall inside IR35...Bummer!

**NotAllThere** · 22 October 2008, 06:57

Originally posted by pleomax View Post

...
I would have expected them to be all over them like a rash as i am sure the brolly wants it money?...

Not really. Unless they pay you before they get paid, it's a very small amount that they're risking.

**NotAllThere** · 22 October 2008, 07:02

Originally posted by pleomax View Post

1. Do you need to use and accountant on a by Monthly basis?
2. Could your spouse do your day to day books and just pay for them to be
ratified at year end? (Tax savings there?)
3. Registered business address? What if your mortgage paperwork states taht
you cant? (Did i read some where that you could claim a portion of house
hold expenses for business use?)

You use the accountant as and when you need them - their service could be covered by a monthly fee, or be ad-hoc.
2. You don't legally need an accountant. It's a good idea to have one, and you should get one that's knowledgeable about contracting and who charges you less if you keep your own books.
3. Ask your mortgage provider. Running a business, with people coming and going to your home is one thing, having a registered office and doing some of your accounting from, or remote working is entirely another.

Moving from Umbrella to Ltd Co