In the event that the householder suffered casualty or death some time after the work was carried out then there may be a paper trail of an invoice and/or sales receipt generated from the work undertaken. That will lead Plod to your front door sooner than sharpish.
One assumes that the householder might be found smouldering on the floor (when the ceiling fixture has been touched) by a family member. That family member might well remember "oh yes, he/she had that fitting looked at by someone last year". And in the particular case that I refer to I was doing the job on behalf of a landlord - the landlord is definitely going to remember they paid to have the light fitting sorted, otherwise the landlord would become liable (probably).
I don't think it is safe to assume that non-compliance won't be traceable.
What it is bound to do however is to increase the black market racketeering, and dear old Gordon Brown is most likely going to see less tax dollars, not more, as electrical practitioners trouser the cash rather than get the electrics tested. That will become even more likely because if the householder phones an electrician who says "that'll be 150 quid with the test certificate", and phones another who says "50 quid in readies without test certificate", guess which one the householder is going to go for?
That first sparky might have done the job originally for say 70 quid, not a huge increase on the 50 quid and the householder might not feel inclined to get a 2nd quote. Gordon would have got his tax on the 70 quid being properly declared - instead he gets SFA because the money goes into the black economy.
It seems overall I am probably paying 51% of my takings to the government. My marginal rate could be around 55% or so. Company car benefit (which is tax & NI on money I haven't had) at the new rates would be the equivalent of about another 5%.
Intuitively, being taxed at 17.5% vat + 40% +11% +11% + sundries one would expect to pay more than 55%. I suppose the error lies in the fact that once money has gone to the gov. in tax it doesn't attract tax at the other levels, not yet anyway, something to be thankful for!
For which you've got the car. For me the change in CC tax rules was an absolute winner. My new Honda Jazz cost me (technically my company of course) £11,200, 25% of this (reducing) each year set against corporation tax, along with road tax, insurance and servicing. I pay 15% x £11.2K x 40% in tax = £13p.w. for the benefit of having a brand new car, all expenses paid except petrol. If the company decided to allocate £3,000 to me instead of to car expenses I'd end up with £25p.w. net + £13 less tax = £38p.w. to run a car - finance, depreciation, servicing, tax and insurance. Actual costs as before say £60. So having the company car is equivalent (in my case) to several percent off tax not on.
Mr Chairman (Dave): Point of clarification please. Meaning?
"Snip ...... the chap that services her (GAS?) water heater ...... snip ..... that her electric cooker could only be replaced (BY A GAS COOKER?) by a registered tradesperson".
Or am I missing the point? Slightly!
Sounds like the usual business of a) Don't believe everything (much) of what you are told and b) Any buyer or potential buyers responsibility to find out to a sufficient degree what they are agreeing to/contracting for; caveat emptor.
I was thinking much more of the D-I-Y case where the householder has removed and replaced the kitchen light him/herself. Obviously if the work has been paid for then there is, as you say, a paper trail to follow.
I have, over the years, rewired large parts of our house. How could anyone possibly decide which bits I have done and which I haven't? (Except, hopefully, that my bits look better than the original)
I've never quite understood this. Presumably if you pay company car benefit, you don't need a car of your own? Unless, of course, you wouldn't normally have a car - or would run an old banger doing all the repairs etc yourself.
Absolutely. I really don't think those who complain about being taxed on a company car have ever worked out the costs of running their own - like for like.
But I didn't want it. It's full of drawings, tools, test equipment and spare parts. I use my wife's car at weekends and don't have to travel to work.
In the first instance the IR reduced my allowances by £7.4k, this for a 5 year old Fiat Ulysse (80k miles) worth about £4.75k ! I got it reduced to £4.4k but that still seemed a raw deal.
I now don't run a company car and claim the mileage allowance. I take it you've investigated that option, it's attractive if you do a lot of business miles in a car that's cheap to own/run.
For info: In Canada one can claim against income tax that percentage of your home expenses that you can fairly attribute to being self employed or operating a business (or part of it) from/at home. But only if you first make a profit; that percentage cannot create or increase a business loss. (I guess the rationale is that you have to live somewhere and if you decide to have a home office, a storeroom, meet clients, use the phone and internet etc. at home to conduct business then you can claim 'Reasonable' expenses against taxable income to the federal and provincial governments for the part use of it.
When it comes to the the municipal classification of the property and whether to charge business taxes it's not a problem AFIK because the percentage of the home used is usually pretty small e.g. typically 10 to 12 per cent, say, of the total floor area. Also home based business facilities are generally used for a very small percentage of time; typically less 20% of a 24 hour day, depending on the type of business!
Also it would be pretty ridiculous if a visiting potential customer to my home said "May I please use your bathroom" and that caused me to be business taxed municipally for water. Just about as ridiculous as giving that customer a cup of tea or coffee (or even something stronger! Maybe some home made wine?) and then claiming that my premises are now a restaurant/cafe serving refreshments or are a wine making operation. The type of "Business use of a percentage of the home" does favour 'white collar' workers. What does get undesirable attention is the family fixing up cars in the backyard or the retiree refinishing furniture in their basement or garden shed and making a bit of noise about it! And then there are the people who have 'permanent' yard/boot/junk sales going on. Not 'every' Saturday please! BTW 'Splitting' one's income with a spouse or other member of the family is a RECOMMENDED way of reducing income tax here. It is even mentioned as a 'Tax Tip' in some CCRA (Canada Customs and Revenue Agency) previously dubbed 'Revenue Canada', publications!
While one may feel that CCRA just try to give you the feeling they are on your side CCRAs mandate or code clearly states, "Taxpayers may arrange their affairs to minimize the tax paid". Trouble with all this regulation is that one starts running your business in a manner which has to take into account all the tax rules and or other legislation. As an example; if I lease a vehicle as opposed to buying and depreciating one against the business which is the most favourable from a tax viewpoint? OR: Shall I hire two casual employees daily for half a day each or one person full time, which brings into play whether they are of equal competence versus the work available, and 'I don't care if they get enough hours to qualify for Unemployment Insurance at end of the busy season'; or do I? If I employ my son/daughter then ...... ?
And obviously one can't keep pigs in the back garden in a residential area!
Since it is claimed that, in Canada, 80% of the jobs are provided by "Small Business" the complexity of regulation is IMHO disincentive to small business persons; even when they are attempting to be legal and ethical.
As a personal opinion against 'excessive' taxation and regulation (not zero taxation), probably all of it meant with good intent, and as a footnote, see the uk.d-i-y and other 'handy persons' news groups, I estimate that if one can do ones own repair/construction/plumbing/electrical work oneself, even using/buying all new materials at normal retail, that it can cost
40 to 50% less than contracting that work. The person/company doing the work, say, being subject to taxes and regulations that increase the difficulty of doing and consequently their costs charged to you.
If one can recycle used materials, again using one's own labour and time, it is even cheaper, estimated at 30% or even less. And, in my opinion it's at the point where it has become in many cases a complete disincentive. It's part of the attitude and a factor where consumers will say "Aw to heck with it, chuck that in the dumpster/bin and buy a new one!" (from China!). That buy new can reduce the work available which in turn reduces local economic activity.
However these days the UK seems to be a pretty prosperous place, compared to 50 years ago? And consumers seem content to pay high costs?
Anyway. I'm shortly retiring, at age 70; so forgive my rant! Terry.
I made another post at the same time as this one of yours that addresses this point in my particular circumstances.
But I would add it's a bit of a strange concept IMO to have to pay
*Income* tax on money you've never received because you've not had to spend it, esp. if it costs your employer little or nothing. I hope the chancellor doesn't go any further with it I don't want to pay *Income* tax on my oscilloscope + multimeter + PAT tester USW USW.
Certainly, or your wife runs a car
The new C.Car ruels are also unfair IMO in that they don't distinguish between essential car users who have the benefit of incidental private use of a company car, and cars supplied entirely as perks.
The reasoning is that the company makes available to you a car, and you get to use the car privately as well as for business. The private use element counts as income and is taxed.
If you don't (ever) use this car for non-business purposes, then you can ask your employer to forbid you to use it except for business. Then it becomes "not available" for private use and should not count as a benefit and not be taxed as income.
The reason you pay tax on a company car is that it's assumed you get private use from it, so it's a benefit in kind.
And they do tax similar things. If I get protective clothing supplied, it's considered a benefit as it could be used for leisure. Similarly, a taxi paid for to take me home from work after public transport has finished is also considered a perk and taxed - even although I might have a season ticket for public transport. Same with an hotel provided for overnight accommodation when working away from home.
Strangely, these rules don't apply to MPs...
Well, presumably she needs one in her own right - otherwise she could use your company one?
Perhaps. But it's a very difficult thing to substantiate. If the vehicle is purely for company use, why not get a sign written van?
I do run my own -now, and my wife always did. I reckon I could make a profit out of the no profit mileage rate over 4 years by changing to a cheap to run car (Skoda Fabia diesel) and won't be sending 2k to the revenue every year. If you are running your own company there's another issue, the company gets all the running costs as well as, if it's someone else's company it's different
From the outside that may look to be the case. However one of the things this current Labour government have excelled at is manipulating the media - both internally and externally. The truth is so much different to the fiction seen from afar.
Before coming to power Labour claimed, rightly from facts which were present at the time, that the previous Tory administration had introduced about 55 new taxes (I admit that figure may not be quite accurate as I don't recall the exact figure - but it's somewhere close). That was in a 19 year period of office from 1978 to 1997.
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Labours 6 years of office since 1997 they have managed to introduce 60 new taxes - many of them by stealth. And as is their way, they have introduced paving legislation (I think that's what it is called) which basically translates to them being able to introduce and change tax -and other - laws without introducing them to parliament where they can be openly discussed and voted upon.
Gordon Brown (chancellor) has been quite famous for triple accounting in his budgets, where the same numbers get counted multiple times in order to make the numbers he wishes to make known. The current story (from the Home Secretary David Blunkett) is that we are recruiting more police and teachers than ever before. That may be true, but it sure would put matters into perspective if they admitted the numbers that were leaving were also higher than ever before.
Another thing Gordon did in the early days of his chancellorship was to quietly sell off the UKs gold reserves. We used to have about 17% reserves at the time he came to power - we now have closer to 7%. Which means that when the UK economy does fall into trouble we haven't got money in the bank to help us out of crisis:
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other things they promised in their manifesto that during this current parliament there would be a free vote put to the people of the country about further European integration - as in ditching the pound and replacing it with the Euro so that there was a common currency across the European Union. But because there has been much public opposition they have quietly ditched the idea and refuse to discuss when the vote might take place.
It goes on and on and on. They give politicians a bad name, and that's saying something.
You may not have heard of IR35, which initially targetted IT consultants but in this years budget was extended to cover nannies, butlers, gardeners, anyone who was offering personal service via a Limited company.
If IR35 applies (and the Inland Revenue will always claim it does despite their rhetoric) then 95% of company income MUST be treated as personal salary - you can do what you like with the other 5%, like pay your accountant and so on.
And that's despite you having official receipts which cannot be ignored which might equate to 20-30% of company turnover.
So if your Limited company earned 10K for the year then the first 9.5K would have to be accounted for as personal salary - and if your real expenses were more than 0.5K then by government order you run the company at a loss. Naturally, if you apply the rules for Limited companies then you are required to close down the Limited company at the first sign that the company cannot trade solvently and has no possibility of paying its debts in the future.
There are cases still running between the Inland Revenue and private Limited companies which have been active for over 2 years, causing much stress and anxiety for the individual.
If it's in the lowest CO2 band you now only pay 22/40% x 15% of the list price, i.e. £330 or £600 for a £10K car. If you do a lot of business mileage (I do almost none) then taking 40p/mile for your own cheap to run car probably makes more sense.
He shouldn't need to ask, but he should be able to tell you why. Maybe it's because, as the boss, you can forbid yourself private use, but could equally well re-permit it at the drop of a hat.
It seems to me that, provided your office is at home, so there is no possibility of commuting involved, then if you actually have your own separate car for private use, then a good case can be made for treating the business car as business-only.
In any case, wouldn't it be cheaper to run the business car privately and charge mileage rates to your business?
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