Archives – February, 2012
After the fanfare of publicity and stern warnings issued in recent months, HMRC has taken a U turn on its business record checks campaign. Now, rather than making threats of indiscriminate inspections to identify record keeping issues, they have declared any future inspections will be much more targeted.
HMRC has said that they will carry out any planned visits but will postpone any new SME business record checks (BRC) until a new approach has been developed which concentrates on higher risk businesses. New visits will not resume until HMRC announces the detail of a ‘revamped’ approach, which is expected some time after April 2012. (more…)
February 27, 2012
There are a lot of changes afoot this year for business owners with the government planning plenty of new policies for employers. Taking a short break from tax issues, we outline some of those most likely to impact our clients.
Pensions
Although the government has announced that automatic enrolment legislation for pensions will start as planned for employers with more than 250 employees, smaller companies are being given more time. Organisations with between 50 and 249 employees are getting an extra year, and will need to start auto-enrolling employees between 1 April 2014 and 1 April 2015. Companies with under 50 employees will not have to auto enrol their staff for pensions until April 2017. (more…)
February 27, 2012
As announced in the 2012 Finance Bill, there have been a number of important changes to VAT rules, which it is important clients are aware of.
1. VAT and Academy schools
We have recently come across a number of academies who have applied for VAT registration without taking proper advice in relation to the implications and without weighing up the pros and cons of what VAT registration means for them. It is actually possible for schools with academy status to reclaim VAT incurred on non-business activities without the need for VAT registration and all the complications that come with it.
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February 24, 2012
In last month’s Livewire newsletter, we reported a change to the ruling that shareholders informally winding up their companies can distribute any remaining funds as capital and depending on the circumstances, can also benefit from entrepreneurs’ relief.
With effect from 1st March, if the company concerned has distributable funds in excess of £25,000 all funds distributed will be treated as dividends and subjected to income tax in the usual way. This means tax will be payable at rates from 25% to 36% depending on the individual circumstances, rather than potentially at a rate of 10% if distributed as capital.
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February 23, 2012
It’s very rare that our blogs are in any way trumpet blowing, but this is something we are all really pleased about and, we think, well worth a mention on Taxtalk.
As one of the Surrey area’s leading local accountants and business software specialists, Robert James Partnership has been selected as a Platinum Partner for the Sage 50 suite by business software and services provider Sage UK.
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February 15, 2012
