If you are planning to leave the UK to take up residence in another country you should complete the HMRC form P85 on departure to claim any tax repayment due to you. This form has recently been revised to take account of the new statutory residence test (SRT) for defining if a person is resident in the UK, or not resident, for tax purposes. The operation of the SRT can be very complex, so ask one of our tax experts for clarification of when you will be treated  escaping the UK tax net. 

CLICK HERE - Form P85 when leaving the UK

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From 6 April 2013 any unincorporated business (not companies or LLPs) can use fixed rate expenses to replace the calculation of actual costs incurred in these categories of expenses:

• Motoring costs (using the approved mileage rates of 45p or 25p);
• Use of home for business purposes (based on number of hours used per month); and 

Private use of part of commercial premises, such as a hotel (based on number of occupants who are business owners or their immediate family).

CLICK HERE - Fixed rate expenses

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This new service will be available from 22 April 2013 on the HMRC website. It allows charities and community amateur sports clubs (CASCs), to submit tax claims online in respect of the gift aid donations they have received.

The tax claims will be processed in 15 days rather than 30 days for paper forms, and the reporting process has been simplified. For example individual donations of £20 or less can be aggregated up to a total of £1,000, and the sponsors of individuals taking part in sponsored events do not have to be listed separately unless a single donation is £500 or more.

CLICK HERE - Charities online -  guidance for charities

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If you are about to surrender a life policy please take advice to ensure the proceeds are taxed as intended. A partial surrender of the policies can result in 95% of the proceeds being subject to income tax, even where you extract no more than you have paid in premiums on the policies. This happened to Mr Lobler who paid $1.4 million as policy premiums, extracted about the same amount over 4 years, made no profit, but ended up paying tax of $560,000. (The policies were valued in US dollars as they were held off-shore.

CKLICK HERE - Joost Lobler v HMRC TC02559

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HMRC have started a campaign to encourage disclosure of undeclared profits from the sale of second or buy-to-let homes. To use this property sales campaign, and take advantage of the reduced penalties on offer, you must pay all the tax due by 6 September 2013. But the first step is to register to make a disclosure, which must be done by 9 August 2013, and we can help with this. The disclosure must include any rental income generated by the property, not just the gains.

CLICK HERE - Property Sales Campaign

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HMRC has a duty to explain what taxpayers need to know to do deal with the tax system. To help achieve this goal they have provided 43 educational videos on YouTube designed for small businesses and individuals. The topics include; self-assessment for child-minders, the Construction Industry Scheme (six videos), VAT & tax when trading with other countries, the Patent Box scheme, Excise Duty, and Record Keeping. They are all free to watch and only last a few minutes each.

CLICK HERE - HMRC YouTube channel

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Most employers are required to start using RTI from the first pay day on or after 6 April 2013. But the PAYE computer will be taken off-line for upgrades from 3 to 6 April 2013, so you won’t be able to submit any RTI returns until the system comes back up by Monday 8 April at the latest. Those employers who normally pay a monthly payroll between 1^st and 5^th of the month will not be required to join RTI until the next pay date, which could be in May 2013.

CKLCK HERE - HMRC statement re April 2013 shut-down

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The central theme of George Osborne's fourth Budget was to continue to "tackle the economy's problems head on" whilst helping "those who want to work hard and get on".  Whether his announcements will "support an aspiration nation" as he hopes remains to be seen. 

We have summarised the main changes arising out of his 2013 Budget Report which we hope will help you to understand its impact on your own financial life.

Budget Synopsis

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If you run small hotel, or perhaps live above your pub, a portion of the property expenses will be treated as ‘private’ and not deductible from the business profits. How that private use amount is calculated may have been set–down in an informal agreement with the Tax Office many years ago. Now HMRC are cancelling all those informal agreements with effect from 31 March 2013. Instead you will have to use the following table of cost exclusions for the private use of business premises:

CLICK HERE - Simpler income tax for the simplest small businesses, see Annex C

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Some people forget to declare on their tax return disposals of investments which have made a loss. There is no harm done until you want to make use of that loss. A capital loss must be claimed before it can be set against a later capital gain. The deadline for claiming capital losses is now four years from the end of the tax year in which the loss arose, so you can still claim for losses made in 2008/09.

CLICK HERE - How to declare a loss for capital gains

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