Being self employed and the coronavirus

[mattg4321]

You self employed sole traders shouldn't complain too much.

I'm one of 2 directors of a ltd company. At the moment we are the only employees, although we have had more in the past. We are not eligible for the self employed scheme as we are somewhere between self employed and employed (usually depending on whether it suits the taxman or not).

We both paid around £500 less tax last year than a sole trader would have, yet we can only furlough for the PAYE portion of our income.

Would have to live on £585 each a month and if furloughed we're not allowed to work. We still have to pay van costs, scam fees, insurances etc etc out of this. It's a bit of a joke as we had months of work lined up before this. Some of it has stopped because we can't work in peoples homes in most cases and some because of lack of materials holding jobs up - plaster and plasterboard mostly it seems.

Currently working 1 week in 4 to try and keep money coming in. Bloody irritating that we are not allowed to keep working and receive help like SE can. People have an impression that dividends are a massive tax dodge and fiddle, yet you can only use the system legally as it is put in front of you. Some people suggest we should pay our wages entirely PAYE. If we did this our tax liability would be thousands more than any other type of employment a year. Dividends are taxed at 7.5% for basic rate taxpayers and that's after you've already paid 19% corporation tax on the same money.

Can imagine quite a few people will be deferring their VAT bill and folding the company later on in the year with nothing left within it. Government needs to come up with a grant for businesses without premises IMO. Otherwise furloughed employees will go down with the director/owners.

In better news we have already received the (paltry) furlough money for April from HMRC.

 

[Zerax]

Lockdown is an abject failure of policy and based on highly questionable "science". There is no doubt in my mind that these types of response will lead to more deaths than COVID-19. (There is also little evidence that they will reduce the COVID-19 deaths either.) And judging deaths with COVID-19 as deaths by COVID-19 is inherently dishonest.

You may be right... the approach taken by Sweden may be right... but the problem is that the media run the country ! And the generally left wing media have dictated that ANY deaths that are attributed to Covid-19 are the responsibility of the government for not doing something to stop it.

I notice that the BBC even ran a programme tonight to blame the government... I didn't watch the programme, I hasten to add, but why have a programme about it anyway ???

The simple fact is... that the NHS (generally, not all those nurses !), PHE and all the other associated quangos are totally unfit for purpose ! The lockdown is all about not overloading them... if we had a sensibly run health system and a sensible media... we could probably have avoided any lockdown...
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We both paid around £500 less tax last year than a sole trader would have, yet we can only furlough for the PAYE portion of our income.

I assume you take your other income as dividends which you take as owners. The furlough scheme is for employees... so it seems perfectly sensible to me that you only get furlough payments on your PAYE portion.

I'm a shareholder in some businesses but I wouldn't expect in a million years to get government money for loss of dividends !
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Government needs to come up with a grant for businesses without premises IMO.

Matt... the problem is that it is VERY VERY difficult to come up with a scheme that benefits only those that should get some benefit. And even if that was easily possible, it needs to be done in a few days !! All government functions work very very slowly... it'll take months to implement any agreed scheme.

There was a story today about how a grant scheme for Cornish businesses had given large amounts of money to second home owners... because they were running properties as FHL (furnished holiday lets) so were a legitimate business. Of course, this was not at all the intention of the scheme, but how do you remove some businesses but include others ???

 

[mattg4321]

I assume you take your other income as dividends which you take as owners. The furlough scheme is for employees... so it seems perfectly sensible to me that you only get furlough payments on your PAYE portion.

I'm a shareholder in some businesses but I wouldn't expect in a million years to get government money for loss of dividends !

In normal times no, but I wouldn't expect to get a handout like sole traders do, or my furloughed staff paid for in normal times either. The idea is we help keep these businesses going in the meantime. It seems you're suggesting dividends are a tax dodge. To put it another way, given that I am VAT registered, I generate far more tax than many sole traders, yet they are helped far more that me. In financial terms and they are also allowed to work through this period and receive help at the same time.

Matt... the problem is that it is VERY VERY difficult to come up with a scheme that benefits only those that should get some benefit. And even if that was easily possible, it needs to be done in a few days !! All government functions work very very slowly... it'll take months to implement any agreed scheme.

There was a story today about how a grant scheme for Cornish businesses had given large amounts of money to second home owners... because they were running properties as FHL (furnished holiday lets) so were a legitimate business. Of course, this was not at all the intention of the scheme, but how do you remove some businesses but include others ???

I agree, and maybe UBI would've been a better and fairer way to do things, but the government thought this way would preserve more jobs. Unless they help small business owners soon it may not.

They could've put owner/directors into the same/similar scheme as self employed. Dividends sources would have to be from their own businesses and could be proved by bank statements and being signed as true by the business accountant. Government pays out and claws back later if necessary. Just saying it's too difficult isn't good enough. It's a lame excuse.

This would also allow owner/directors to work and try to keep their company afloat whilst also receiving the help they need. The scheme could even be adjusted to slightly less than 80% annual profits to allow for the argument that owner directors pay slightly less in tax than sole traders. However as I mentioned above this isn't always totally the truth if one is VAT registered and the other not.

 

[davesparks]

wow, were do I sign up. the end of the day they will get that money back by hook or by crook.

You sign up here:

Universal Credit

Universal Credit is replacing 6 other benefits with a single monthly payment if you're out of work or on a low income - eligibility, how to prepare.

www.gov.uk

Fill in the forms and wait a few days for someone to phone you to discuss your application.

 

[andyb]

wow, were do I sign up. the end of the day they will get that money back by hook or by crook.

Don't get excited Buzz, you any advance payment you get is a loan.

 

[buzzlightyear]

Don't get excited Buzz, you any advance payment you get is a loan.

your correct there, so the end of the day you will need to pay it back the tax man don't give monie away, so when this made in China virus is over watch the taxes go up to recover all monies that was Lound.
don't forget some company's will go bang bankrupt and lay off staff and start again.
So any monies owed to wholesales they will have to whistle dicksy.

 

[davesparks]

your correct there, so the end of the day you will need to pay it back the tax man don't give monie away, so when this made in China virus is over

An advance on universal credit is paid back out of future universal credit payments yes, but you don't pay back the universal credit payments.

 

[Zerax]

so the end of the day you will need to pay it back the tax man don't give monie away

As DaveSparks says... it gets paid back out of future payments. But in the current climate, I can't see em even asking for it back, they'd probably not even bother in normal times.

The Working Tax Credits system, when it first started, was full of errors... I know two people that received cheques for several thousand pounds in error. When they queried it, they were told just to cash them as they'd never get asked to pay it back.

 

[andyb]

As DaveSparks says... it gets paid back out of future payments. But in the current climate, I can't see em even asking for it back, they'd probably not even bother in normal times.

The Working Tax Credits system, when it first started, was full of errors... I know two people that received cheques for several thousand pounds in error. When they queried it, they were told just to cash them as they'd never get asked to pay it back.

They don't ask for it back, they take it back out of future payments.

 

[davesparks]

As DaveSparks says... it gets paid back out of future payments. But in the current climate, I can't see em even asking for it back, they'd probably not even bother in normal times.

The process of paying it back is automatically set up when the advance is made, so they will take it back.

 

[westward10]

This is slightly drifting from the thread topic. If you want to start a debate on the Covid origin start another thread.
Thread now cleaned up.

 

[littlespark]

I applied for UC a couple weeks ago... they took details of my wife and I's savings, and everything we have in the bank.... We fall into the "between 6 and 16k category"
2 kids, and the 3rd, the 19 year doesn't count...although she is living with us since her uni closed (shes got her student loan anyway that she hasn't spent yet)

My wife gets her 80% furlough from her part time job.
We will be told May 14th how much we are getting, to be paid by the 19th.
Our savings are depleting fast. Will I need to tell them on the online system how much we are spending weekly, as they want to know how much income we might be making.. (my wifes pay, and any work I do.)

Is UC different to the original plans that were made for SE, that should be coming in June?

 

[davesparks]

I applied for UC a couple weeks ago... they took details of my wife and I's savings, and everything we have in the bank.... We fall into the "between 6 and 16k category"
2 kids, and the 3rd, the 19 year doesn't count...although she is living with us since her uni closed (shes got her student loan anyway that she hasn't spent yet)

My wife gets her 80% furlough from her part time job.
We will be told May 14th how much we are getting, to be paid by the 19th.
Our savings are depleting fast. Will I need to tell them on the online system how much we are spending weekly, as they want to know how much income we might be making.. (my wifes pay, and any work I do.)

Is UC different to the original plans that were made for SE, that should be coming in June?

Yes universal credit is just the latest name for unemployment benefit or the dole.
The other tenant in my house has been receiving it for the last couple of months as she was unemployed, they received their share of our rent (50% of our total rent) plus a monthly personal allowance.
They started work in the middle of last month so only got paid a small advance, this was deducted from their total UC payment and they received the difference.

You don't tell them how much you spend per week, you only give them your housing costs. You get a set amount as the personal allowance portion of it.

Yes it's different to the self employment 80% scheme and you will have to declare that income from the 80% scheme on your UC account

 

[Zerax]

They don't ask for it back, they take it back out of future payments.

So... you agree to repay it over the next 12 months (repaid as a deduction from your future benefit). Then... after 2 months, you stop claiming (so don't have any benefit for the repayments to come out of). 10 months of repayments become outstanding. Then what ??

I think if they sent the 'heavies' round... it would be all over the papers !!

 

[plugsandsparks]

• Housing Benefit.
• Child Tax Credit.
• Income Support.
• Working Tax Credit.
• Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance.
• Income-related Employment and Support Allowance

Above is the full list of legacy benefits that UC replaces, as you can see its somewhat more than unemployment benefit . In fact the important point is that you can receive UC and be in work, albeit on low income.

If anyone is in the 6K-16K category then you receive a proportion based on the actual savings, as these savings get depleted keep updating your journal to get a recalculation done.
Hope this helps