[Tosh]

I'm with Squeaks on this one.   

[williamx]

Eight years back I took the view that as a trad window cleaner we needed a good washing machine to replace the one that had "died". We bought a Miele which is a very solid bit of kit and put 50% of it towards business expense and wrote that 50% down over four years. Now I'm wfp and use it less, but it 's still going strong.

Also about the same time I bought a very solid 12 x 8 shed, lined it out as an office and also used it to store my gear and ladders and that was a business expense and it is still going strong now. When I went wfp I moved my office to a corner of our dining room but the shed had depreciated to zero value and so I had no residual value to benefit from when I took it back to personal use.

This year I will charge a percentage of my house utilities for business expenses in the proportion that I estimate I use them.

You can't do that I'm afraid, if you want to claim a percentage of your utilities including council tax, then the room you use for your business must not be used for any other purpose, so i you are using your living room, you cannot use that room other than for business, and it also cannot have any furniture other than office furniture in it.

You can claim between £3 and £5 per week to cover expences occured from using your home, check with your local tax office on what they allow.

[Klean07]

I pay £300 for a bookeeper and £250 for my accountant. Though from April I'll be ditching one of them.

[Pj]

Your be far lass likely to have your file pulled out the in tray if it`s done by an accountant trust me,with a chartered accountants name to it they normally just file it if you send it in your bound to get a pull somewhere down the line in my experience,£200 is better then having that over your head.

So what would be your experience exactly?


I have 2 family members who are tax inspectors working in self assessment and I know exactly how you get selected.

[RSWindows]

Your be far lass likely to have your file pulled out the in tray if it`s done by an accountant trust me,with a chartered accountants name to it they normally just file it if you send it in your bound to get a pull somewhere down the line in my experience,£200 is better then having that over your head.

So what would be your experience exactly?


I have 2 family members who are tax inspectors working in self assessment and I know exactly how you get selected.

WELL?   Spill the beans!  dont keep us all hanging in suspence!

[G O A]

HYDRO

You can't do that I'm afraid, if you want to claim a percentage of your utilities including council tax, then the room you use for your business must not be used for any other purpose, so i you are using your living room, you cannot use that room other than for business, and it also cannot have any furniture other than office furniture in it.

You can claim between £3 and £5 per week to cover expences occured from using your home, check with your local tax office on what they allow.
[/quote


not strictly true i have a friend who is a business advisor and who has run his own businesses for 40 odd years you can put percentage of electric for washing cloths and clothes phone bill line rental part of,any thing to do with business are you saying you cant put petrol receipts in cause sometimes you nip to the shop in your van 

[williamx]

HYDRO

You can't do that I'm afraid, if you want to claim a percentage of your utilities including council tax, then the room you use for your business must not be used for any other purpose, so i you are using your living room, you cannot use that room other than for business, and it also cannot have any furniture other than office furniture in it.

You can claim between £3 and £5 per week to cover expences occured from using your home, check with your local tax office on what they allow.
[/quote


not strictly true i have a friend who is a business advisor and who has run his own businesses for 40 odd years you can put percentage of electric for washing cloths and clothes phone bill line rental part of,any thing to do with business are you saying you cant put petrol receipts in cause sometimes you nip to the shop in your van 

When I went on the courses that the tax man run at the tax office, they said that you can claim a persentage of the gas,electric and council tax if you use a roon as an office.

But they did point out  that you cannot use that room for its original purpose, so for example if you use a bedroom you cannot have any bedroom furniture or beds in it.

If you do and they do a home inspection they will fine you and ask you to pay the back taxex for the last 6 years.

Don't rely on what an advisor says, check it out with the tax man, even I might be wrong, because these courses I was on was 2 years ago. 

[RSWindows]

Is it 6 years books u need to keep, for some reason i was under the impression it was 5.

[williamx]

Nope its 6 years, or if you like me forever

[ps outthere]

I would think the tax people have enough information on window cleaners, as there will be a few years of records from the likes of us, to know what the income and expenses should be, including start up costs etc, and some of these records will have been verified.
They will have percentages worked out; if your information doesn't match their graphs/charts there is, probably, a greater chance they will descend on you with fangs exposed.

[luther1]

Doesn't matter if the spare room has a bed in it. You can use the lounge if you want,just have a make shift desk.If the room is solely used as an office,or claimed to be,you would then have to pay business rates,as you would with the converted shed.

[macmac]

receipts mean nothing, it's money you've earned they're interested in, & money is very much harder to hide than you think.
REMEMBER- it's up to you to prove them wrong, NOT the other wat round!! If indeed you ever get "pulled".

Tony

[cherubs cleaning]

depreation on your van is a good one





jerry