Uncommercial Lets Background There are a number of situations where an individual may rent out a property at an uncommercial rate, often to a family member or friends. This may be following the inheritance of a property, having purchased a property for capital growth rather than a rental stream or having bought a property for a family member at university for example. Whilst...
Points based penalties
In the recently published draft clauses that will form the basis of the Budget later this year, HMRC has outlined a significant change to the way they will be levying penalties for late filing breaches under the Making Tax Digital regulations. Rather than base penalties on each transgression, taxpayers will receive a penalty point per event, and when these penalties reach...
Changes to rent a room relief
A new test is to be added to the qualifying criteria for rent-a-room relief from April 2019. The test will require that the individual or individuals in receipt of income – the home owner(s) – will need to share occupancy of the residence in question with the individual whose occupation of the furnished accommodation is generating the receipts – the lodger. In...
When is Capital Gains Tax payable
Notwithstanding any of the comments that follow, an individual is allowed to make tax-free capital gains of £11,700 during 2018-19. There are also a number of circumstances when a disposal does not create a taxable gain. These include: The sale of personal assets worth less than £6,000. Gifts to your spouse or civil partner. Gifts to a charity. Gains when you cash in ISAs or...
Ask the government to sell property
UK residents can ask for publicly owned land and buildings to be sold if they think that the property is vacant or underused. You will need to track down the owner of the land and ask for the property to be sold. Your application will not entitle you to purchase the land, the owners may want to consider other offers. The government...
Tax Diary August/September 2018
1 August 2018 - Due date for Corporation Tax due for the year ended 31 October 2017. 19 August 2018 - PAYE and NIC deductions due for month ended 5 August 2018. (If you pay your tax electronically the due date is 22 August 2018) 19 August 2018 - Filing deadline for the CIS300 monthly return for the month ended 5 August...
Undeclared offshore assets
From 1 October more than 100 countries, including the UK, will be able to exchange data on financial accounts under the Common Reporting Standard (CRS). CRS data will significantly enhance HMRC’s ability to detect offshore non-compliance and it is in taxpayers’ interests to correct any non-compliance before that data is received. The most common reasons for declaring offshore tax are in...
Work from home?
We are often quizzed by clients who are contemplating working from home: what are the tax consequences? And in particular, will I have to pay capital gains tax? Capital gains tax Generally speaking, if your business use is limited to allocating space for a home office, then as long as there is duality of use, no capital gains tax complications should arise...
Muras Matters: Negligible Value Claims
Negligible Value Claims Background Negligible value claims can be a valuable relief which is often easy to overlook. Taxpayers who own assets that have become worthless can make a negligible value claim to reduce their tax liability. Shares are a good example of assets which can easily become worthless, as the collapse of Carillion earlier this year has highlighted. As a result of...
Planning for early losses
If you are setting up a new business, you may discover that establishing a profitable base takes time. If your pre-trading planning discloses an initial loss making period, you may want to take advice about the business structure you adopt. For example, if you set up the business as a company, the early year’s losses can only be carried forward to set...