File your Self-Assessment Tax Return on time before 31st January. The tax year ends on the 5th April, you have to have your return submitted before the 31st January of the following year. Miss the deadline date and you will incur a £100 fine. After 3 months this will start to go up by £10 per day up to a maximum of £900!
Pay your Self-Assessment tax on time on or before 31st January or 31st July and save yourself automatic penalties and interest. If you are one month late the Inland Revenue can increase the tax due by 5%, or £300, if greater. After that it will ratchet up another 5% of the outstanding tax every 6 months! In addition daily interest on the outstanding tax will also be running up the total amount owed to HMRC.
Payments on account for the next tax year. If your tax bill is greater than £1,000 then you make 2 payments on account for the following year. The deadline for the first payment is January 31st, the deadline for the second July 31st. If your taxable income has reduced in the current tax year you are able to make a claim to reduce these payments on account. Please call and we will advise.
File your Corporation Tax returns on time. Filing date is no later than 12 months after the accounting year-end.
Pay the Corporation Tax on time. Although the CT600 Tax Return filing deadline is 12 months after the Year End, the payment date deadline is actually 9 months after the year end!
Filing your Company Accounts with Companies House. The deadline for this is the same as paying your Corporation Tax Bill; 9 months after the year end.
File your tax return quickly if you have tax to pay. ( You should not wait until January!! )You will know well in advance how much to put by before the payment deadline of 31st January.
NIC - Avoid £100 Fine! Beware this fine. Persons commencing self-employment have 3 months to register before a fine is triggered. Please let us know if you are newly self-employed and we will deal with the formalities.
NIC - Class 2 Contributions These apply to all self-employed. They will be charged each year on your Self Assessment Tax Return and are no longer payable monthly.
VAT - Reconcile sales for year with your VAT Returns. Every quarter when you fill in box 6 on your return, "Total value of sales" you are giving the VAT man a valuable piece of information. When he comes along for the periodic visit he will add up the value of sales you have returned and compare them with your accounts. If the sales in your accounts are higher than the outputs, sales declared on your VAT returns then watch out. He will seek to raise an additional assessment.
The myth of Entertaining customers in the UK. It is not a tax deductible expense, but if you are registered for VAT there are circumstances when you are allowed to claim back the input tax on your share of the bill.
Capital Allowances. The Annual Investment Allowance (AIA) means you can claim 100% of the cost of most plant, machinery, equipment, etc up to a total value of £200,000.
Tax Relief for purchase of Energy Efficient Equipment. You can claim a 100% write down, or capital allowance for tax purposes. Even some cars are covered with low CO2 emissions.