Payroll Weston super Mare

Payroll / operating a PAYE scheme

A brief introduction to the Pay As You Earn Scheme:

The PAYE regime is the system of tax collection where employers deduct income tax and national insurance contributions (NICs) from an employees wage. This can be deducted weekly or monthly.

The PAYE system was originally designed to be a simple method of collecting tax at source, however over the years is has become increasingly more complicated with a variety of tax codes being introduced. Cases of employees paying too much or too little tax has become more common in recent years.

eNews - October 2014

Creating Extra Cash-flow 

Could your creative company benefit from a boost to its cash flow? If it produces computer games, films, high-end TV or animation programmes, it may qualify for a new payable tax credit.

All of these products can qualify for extra tax relief if they can be certified as culturally British, and at least a quarter of the core production costs are incurred in the UK. There are some other conditions:

- only businesses trading as companies can qualify for the tax relief, not individuals or partnerships; and- the product must be intended for release to, or to be broadcast to the general public, not produced for training or advertising purposes.
High-end TV programmes are essentially quality drama; not news, current affairs or quiz shows. Unfortunately producing original music doesn't qualify as a creative product for these tax reliefs.

Xero Certified Advisors - Hillmans Accountants

Why do we love Xero?

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Because Hillmans Ltd and Xero are on the same team. Read more. We both work together to provide timely advice to our small business clients, using the latest (and greatest) technology available.

Hillmans Chartered Accountants are Xero Certified Advisors, so it’s safe to say we know our way around the software!

eNews - Sept 2014

Late Filing Penalties 
 
From 6 October 2014 the HMRC computer will automatically issue you with a penalty if you submit your full payment submission (FPS) under RTI "late", or don't submit it at all for a month in which you paid your employees.

So what makes the FPS "late"? HMRC say the FPS must be submitted on or before the day the employer pays the employees (the "payment date"). But is that the day the funds leave the employer's bank account or the day the employee receives the money?

eNews - Aug 2014

Maximising Statutory Maternity Pay   

Paying statutory maternity pay (SMP) is not optional. It must be paid if your employee qualifies, but the good news is that a small business can recover 103% of the SMP paid from HMRC. A business that pays less than £45,000 of class 1 NICs in one tax year is defined as "small" for this purpose.

In a family business there may be scope for maximising the SMP payable for the first six weeks of maternity leave, and hence getting the Government to refund that SMP with a bit extra to cover the employer's NICs due. Let's see how this could work.

VAT and Indirect Exports Change

When you export goods to a country outside the EU the goods are 'zero-rated' for VAT purposes, which means you do not apply VAT to the value of the goods. However, you need to have the paperwork to prove that the goods left the UK.

If your customer does the physical exporting, in that they take possession of the goods in the UK and handle the shipping, this is called an 'indirect export'. HMRC has previously only allowed you to zero rate the goods in this situation if your customer was an 'overseas person' - they had no VAT registration in the UK and no business establishment here. Also the goods must leave the UK within three months of the handover date.

How to use the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS)

The seed enterprise investment scheme (SEIS) is designed to help small companies raise modest amounts of funding (up to £150,000). The investor must subscribe for new shares issued by the company (not buy them from another shareholder), and in return he can claim income tax relief equal to 50% of the cost of those shares. 

If the investor has made a capital gain in the same tax year as he makes the SEIS investment, up to 50% of the amount invested in SEIS shares can be set against that capital gain to reduce the CGT payable. This CGT reduction was 100% for gains in 2012/13, but is only 50% for gains arising in 2013/14.