Absolute Accountants Limited

25/06/2021

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04/12/2020

This is worth sharing more widely - we contacted all of our clients this moring with a quick note to say that we have heard an increasing number of stories about people being contacted in various ways by people claiming to be from HMRC and demanding money – in some cases quite significant sums.

Contact methods that we have heard recently include automated calls with a request to Press 1 to be connected to an officer; text messages asking for you to call a number; direct calls with a person on the other end; emails with links to follow. All of them can seem very genuine, and can be very alarming.

You will know if you have an outstanding tax issue. HMRC would have written to you and copied in your accountant, if you have one, and they would have then discussed it with you. The first you hear of something is NOT going to be a phone call or a text message threatening legal action or bailiffs if you don’t respond immediately. That is just not how the system works.

If you receive any communications at all like this, please call your accountant if you have one. They will be able to check very quickly if there are any problems, and to set your mind at rest if it is just a scam. If you dont have an accountant, call HMRC directly or feel free to call us. If you end up in a conversation with someone who is pressuring you to make payments, tell them that you need to speak to your accountant who handles everything for you. If you tell that to a genuine HMRC officer, they will accept it and ask for the accountant to make contact with them. If you get resistance from whoever you are speaking to when you say that you need to speak to your accountant, it is even more likely that it is a scam and you should just end the call. These people can be very persuasive, seem very genuine and trick otherwise very savvy people into believing them.

We have one particular case of a client who did actually make a significant payment before realising what was going on and calling us. We told them to call their bank immediately in the hope of stopping the payment. They were fortunate and the money had been stopped from leaving the bank because the account being transferred to was on a list of suspected fraudulent accounts. The client was able to get their money back, but the stress and anxiety of it was still a very unpleasant experience. If the account which the money was being transferred to had not made it onto a suspect list, then the money would have been lost.

Please do not make any payments to anyone for tax related matters if you have any doubt at all about what you are being asked to pay and why; and do not make any payments to accounts that you are not certain are HMRC bank accounts. If you don't have an accountant and get contacted like this and aren't sure what to do, please feel free to contact us for advice.

27/04/2020

On the day that furlough payments have started to be received by employers that got claims in last Monday, another piece of potentially game changing news for small business. The devil may be in the detail, but at the top level, 100% government backed loans for small businesses, of up to £50,000. With help from the banks, this should get money flowing that the CBILS scheme has so far been unable to.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak said the loans up to £50,000 should unblock a backlog of applications.

09/04/2020

We are hearing the first reports of clients receiving the cash for grants from local authorities where they rent commercial premises with rateable values less than £50,000.

This is fantastic news for businesses needing to pay wages and suppliers but have already encountered cash flow problems as a result of the pandemic. We know there are lots of people still to receive anything, and others who unfortunately currently wont get much if any support, but it is the first actual cash support that has made it to businesses that we are aware of.

We don't expect all payments will get made on the same day, but many will have been. If you believe you are entitled to a grant and haven't received it yet, make sure you have given your local authority everything they need to pay it out to you. If you have any doubts, speak to your accountant, or let us know if you have any questions.

08/04/2020

A bit of an update on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme is available. HMRC says that the portal to make claims will be available from 20 April.

This is important: only businesses with online access to PAYE for Employers through their Business Tax account; or business which have Agents with authorisation to view their client’s PAYE for Employers affairs online will be able to obtain access to the portal to make the furloughing claim.

If you take care of your own PAYE and do not have online access to your PAYE for Employer's account, you can register at https://www.gov.uk/log-in-register-hmrc-online-services. Registration can take up to 10 days, and may be a little longer at the current time, so please do it now if you need to so that your ability to claim wont be delayed.

If you use an accountant or payroll bureau, confirm with them that they have Agent authorisation in place to access your account. NB - we will be directly confirming this to our clients tomorrow.

If you do not have access to your PAYE account online, and you don't currently have an agent and would like to discuss how we can help you, please just let us know. We can still register as agent for new clients and get ready to make claims for them.

Sign in or register for your personal or business tax account, Self Assessment, Corporation Tax, PAYE for employers, VAT and other services

01/04/2020

Local businesses have started receiving letters from the Council about the small business grant funding, where they are rate payers of commercial premises. Basically, they hope to start making payment shortly. If you don't pay rates by direct debit, you need to go to https://www.welhat.gov.uk/coronavirus/business-rates to provide your business rates account information and the bank details you want the payment made to.

Other local authorities seem to have similar messages on their websites, so rather than wait for the letter, if you have a business rates account, go online and make sure the council has all the information they need to make the payment to you as soon as they can.

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26/03/2020

Some good news and some big questions still to work through in terms of support for self employed people that has just been announced.

On a basic level, if the following applies you will get help:
- you are self-employed;
- you submitted a self-assessment for 2018/19;
- you didn't report trading profits more than £50,000; and
- your self-employed income is the majority of your income.

You will get 80% of your average trading profits from self-employment over the last three years, capped at £2,500 per month. It will be a taxable grant, so you don't need to repay it but will have to report it as taxable income. You can carry on working and receiving this support.

If you are eligible, HMRC will contact you directly by the beginning of June. Money will flow from June, when a three month lump sum will be paid.

BUT - the questions we have which are not yet clear are:

- How will the support measures announced so far help director owners of their own limited companies who draw a combination of salary and dividends to make up their monthly incomes?

- What happens for Directors of their own companies who cannot furlough themselves and be allowed to do anything at all to keep their companies running for there to be a business for employees to come back to?

- What support is there for anyone who started their own business (self-employed or limited company) since 6 April 2019?

As more information and clarity becomes available, we will let clients know.

25/03/2020

Guidance relating to the small business grants has been released - see https://bit.ly/smallbizgrantguidance. Most of it we already knew, but there is a bit more information in there which hopefully clarifies timing and eligibility:

- Local Authorities should receive the money from government for this on or before 1 April. We take from this that it can't be long until cash starts to flow to businesses.

- Grants will be paid to the person or business who according to the billing local authority's records was the ratepayer in respect of a relevant property on 11 March 2020.

We haven't yet heard of any business receiving communication from their authorities about claiming the grant. We expect most will receive letters/forms in a very narrow timescale, but it would be helpful if people could comment on whether they have received communication from their authority. This way, others will know, if they are eligible, whether they should be expecting a letter and can follow up in a timely way if things get delayed or caught up in the post. We know many businesses are already clinging on waiting for cash support to start flowing.

21/03/2020

A little bit more information below on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme from HMRC. Basically relevant staff need to be furloughed - i.e stop working in the business altogether during the claim period. Things like holiday allowance will continue to build up.

We have a few questions to clarify next week and will update when we have details. For example, where employees have a company pension and pension contributions are still made, are they reclaimable as part of the scheme. We suspect not but don't yet know for sure.

Below is from the HMRC site:
Under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, all UK employers will be able to access support to continue paying part of their employees’ salary for those employees that would otherwise have been laid off during this crisis.

You will need to:

designate affected employees as ‘furloughed workers,’ and notify your employees of this change - changing the status of employees remains subject to existing employment law and, depending on the employment contract, may be subject to negotiation.

submit information to HMRC about the employees that have been furloughed and their earnings through a new online portal (HMRC will set out further details on the information required)

HMRC will reimburse 80% of furloughed workers wage costs, up to a cap of £2,500 per month. HMRC are working urgently to set up a system for reimbursement. Existing systems are not set up to facilitate payments to employers.

If your business needs short term cash flow support, you may be eligible for a Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan.

20/03/2020

So, lots and lots of extra support is being put on the table. Hopefully it will start materialising in cash in time to save jobs in the very short term. A summary of today's announcements regarding business support:

- A new Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme will enable any employer who retains employees who are otherwise furloughed, to claim up to 80% of salary costs as a grant from HMRC. Capped at £2.5k per month (just above the median salary for employees in the country). It will be backdated to 1 March and initially in place for three months. It will be extended if necessary. Government is aiming for cash to be with businesses before the end of April at the latest.

- The previously announced Coronavirus Business Interruption Loans, which are being 80% underwritten by the Government, will now be interest free for 12 months. Loans should be available from Monday through the banks.

- VAT payments due in the next quarter are being deferred until the end of the year, so anyone with VAT becoming due in the next three months will not have to pay in the usual timescales.

- The next self-assessment payments (due by 31 July 2020) are being deferred to 31 January 2021.

- Self-employed people will be able to access through the Universal Credit system support at a rate equivalent to Statutory Sick Pay.

Some of the support is automatically available and some you will need to proactively apply for. Details will become clearer in the near future. As and when we find out more, we will let our clients know, along with anyone else who needs information to help navigate the various support measures available to them.

20/03/2020

This is an email update we sent to our clients on Tuesday. A couple of people have asked us to share it more widely, as it might help other businesses understand a little more about the support that is coming.

NOTE - a key change that happened after this was written is that the grant available to businesses who receive small business rate relief was increased to £10,000.

We will keep updating with other information as this evolves. We are expecting later on details of further plans by the government to help businesses get through this without laying off staff.

Our clients know they can just call or email with any questions they have throughout this. But if you run a local small business and have any questions, feel free to message us as well and where we can possibly help give any clarity, we will be happy to help.

Stay safe everyone!