Wow! can Prosperity4 really do this for me?

[absoft]

Parasol also say you can claim £15 per day subsistence

In Parasol's latest new newsletter called Paradigm it states:-

Subsistence Claims

......If you do not have receipts to support your claims, you can continue to claim:
£45 per night for hotel accommodation
A meal allowance of up to

- £5 for over 5 hours working

- £15 for over 10 hours working

- £21 per night away.

- £25 “friends and family” allowance.

The key change in supporting un - receipted expenses is that in addition to claiming your daily subsistence you can claim the applicable overnight rate if you are staying away from home. You could therefore claim up to £40 per day subsistence expenses.

So if a responsible Umbrella like Parasol say you can claim £15 a day for meals unreceipted (for being away over 10 hours) then it must be true; mustn't it? Why would they suggest you claim this without receipts if it is not safe to do so?

[Pondlife]

From their expenses guide online

IMPORTANT INFORMATION - PLEASE READ
WHILST WE DO NOT REQUIRE RECEIPTS TO BE SUBMITTED FOR CLAIMS FOR
SUBSISTENCE OR HOTEL ACCOMODATION WHICH IS LESS THAN £45, IT IS AN
INLAND REVENUE STIPULATION THAT WE AUDIT A SELECTION OF CLAIMS ON A
MONTHLY BASIS. IF YOUR CLAIM IS SELECTED FOR AUDIT THEN YOU WILL NEED
TO PROVIDE RECEIPTS TO SUBSTANTIATE YOUR CLAIM – IF YOU CANNOT PROVIDE
THESE RECEIPTS THEN WE ARE OBLIGED TO FORWARD THE DETAILS ONTO THE
INLAND REVENUE FOR FURTHER INVESTIGATION.

HTH

[absoft]

Confusing

Yes I know they said that before but in Paradigm they now say their expenses policy has changed.
What is the point of Parasol saying ..'if you do not have receipts...you can claim £15 subsistence etc' and then expecting you to suddenly produce receipts if they decide to 'audit' you? It doesn't make any sense and would be totally contradictory.

[hattra]

Giant allow £9.50 "incidental expenses" without receipts for over 7 hours and £15 for over 10 hours (at least 6 at work), which is about in line with what I could claim without receipt when I was last in permiedom. Apart from that and mileage claims, everything else has to have receipts. They also don't allow you to claim for capital expenditure .

[malvolio]

Yes I know they said that before but in Paradigm they now say their expenses policy has changed.
What is the point of Parasol saying ..'if you do not have receipts...you can claim £15 subsistence etc' and then expecting you to suddenly produce receipts if they decide to 'audit' you? It doesn't make any sense and would be totally contradictory.

Another reason why people should use umbrellas: it's clearly too difficult to do it for yourself...

What they are saying is that expenses up to those limits can be claimed, and if you are audited then the taxman will probably also allow expenses up to that limit (unless he finds something else astray, in which case he will ask for the tax back). Nobody really expects you to get a receipt for a £3.50 sandwich, but equally nobody expects you not to get a reciept for a £25 pub lunch with wine.

Get it?

[oraclesmith]

What they are saying is that expenses up to those limits can be claimed, and if you are audited then the taxman will probably also allow expenses up to that limit (unless he finds something else astray, in which case he will ask for the tax back). Nobody really expects you to get a receipt for a £3.50 sandwich, but equally nobody expects you not to get a reciept for a £25 pub lunch with wine.

I had a read of the actual dispensation letter from HMRC which is on Prosperity4's website and the HM Inspector actually mention 'per diem' before listing the allowances. This is interesting because one interpretation of per diem is a fixed daily allowance. If the HM Inspector really meant fixed daily allowance, then it means that Prosperity4 employees could ONLY claim the fixed amount for receiptless claims and not anything less. How HMRC deal with the employees personal tax situation would also be interesting in this case, because I guess they could claim that in order to get the fixed allowance you should'nt have a receipt and therefore they shredded it for security reasons. Hmmmm.....