Latest blogs for Services

Brexit: The end of UK audits?

Audit thresholds are linked to the small company limits, which are currently set by the EU. The UK can choose to impose a lower threshold than the small company limits, but not a higher one. As a result of Brexit, power will return to the UK, and as a result the cap on audit thresholds…

Capital Gains Tax when you sell your house – make sure you disclose all the facts to HMRC

HMRC’s ongoing scrutiny of private residence relief is in the news again, with another case going before the First Tier Tribunal. Mr & Mrs Ritchie were partially successful in their claim for relief on the sale of their home, which cost them less than £200,000 but which they sold to a developer for £2 million.…

Useful Apps to Make Your Life Easier – Asset.guru

Asset Guru is currently the only available app I’ve found which offers a complete asset management system, including but not limited to – depreciation calculations, cloud connection, geospatial mapping and many reporting tools along with future projections of assets. Asset Guru is available to use in either Xero or QuickBooks.   Started in Australia, the…

Brexit

Post Brexit: What cutting of red tape might SME’s expect? After almost a full year of foreplay, formal Brexit negotiations with the EU will eventually commence next week. Looking ahead one step further, what can SME’s expect post Brexit? And will the UK Government use this opportunity to further advance their stated policy of reducing…

Complying with the National Minimum Wage

HMRC recently published a list of excuses used by employers for not paying workers the National Minimum Wage: The employee wasn’t a good worker so I didn’t think they deserved to be paid the National Minimum Wage I thought it was ok to pay foreign workers below the National Minimum Wage as they aren’t British…

Ransomware advice for charities

Many organisations across 150 countries, including our own NHS, have been hit by a recent ransomware attack. The vulnerabilities  exploited by the hackers are the same for charities, individuals and public or private sector businesses. The Charity Commission is encouraging charities to follow protection advice released by the City of London Police and the National…

R&D Claims: Is HMRC advance assurance a good idea?

In a bid to give companies more certainty over whether or not their R&D claim will be successful, HMRC introduced an advance assurance process in November 2015. If you pass this new test, HMRC will agree not to enquire into your R&D claims for the first 3 accounting periods of claiming this relief. So is…

Making Tax Digital –Standard Chart of Accounts

For some clients making tax digital is now start to loom with them needing to commence quarterly returns in less than twelve months. With this in mind, they may be looking to set up new software programmes in preparation. But where do you start with the headings to use in your accounts? HMRC have stated…

VAT – Bad debt relief – An important administrative VAT point

Several years ago changes were made to the H M Revenue & Customs policy regarding recovery of output VAT paid over but which hadn’t been received within 6 months of the due date.  Relief for the output VAT can now be obtained much more easily than under the historic process whereby notification was required to…

Cloud based Accountancy – Useful Apps to Make Your Life Easier – GoCardless

  This blog focuses on collecting payments for your business. There are many different payment apps available to use in parallel with either Xero or QuickBooks. The application under review is an app called GoCardless.   GoCardless is made by a company called Directli it allows you to take control of your payments, ensuring your…