Our firm has an enormous amount of experience in dealing with PAYE, self-employed individuals and partnerships.
Malcolm MacLean, Tax Director, has 23 years of Inland Revenue experience as a Revenue Officer and Accounts Investigator before jumping over the fence to become a professional tax advisor.
Whether you are a Company Director, paid employee, a sub contractor in the construction industry, self employed trade's person or partner of a professional practice, we have the experience and know how, to deal with all aspects of self assessment.
We will guide clients as to their tax compliance along side other matters such as VAT registration, payment of National Insurance Contributions, for example, and make you aware of the level of current and future tax liabilities.
Flexible accounting for your business
We are happy to accept information from our client in any form, including very basic records, i.e. the traditional paper bag full of invoices and paperwork, or the more experienced book keepers that provide written ledgers, excel spreadsheets or even computer generated back up copies. Whatever you're current book keeping levels, we will always work alongside you and make the process of transferring information to us as simple as possible. Whoever is working with you will personally collect your records and give a free consultation before any work begins.
We aim to spare you all these headaches and free up your valuable time by offering a comprehensive Individual Self Assessment service, including:
- Liaising with your bank, building society, stockbrokers etc to gather the relevant data for your annual returns
- Calculating your tax liability
- Completing and filing your tax return on your behalf
- Advising you when various payments are due and how much to pay
- Advising on appropriate record retention
- Introducing you to any relevant tax saving ideas
- Representing you in the event of your being selected for investigation by the Inland Revenue
We have a large number of self employed clients and give an extremely personalised and informative service. One of our priorities is to always communicate to our client in a non technical, easy to understand manner.
The construction industry is one of the most volatile sectors in the UK economy, and careful planning and advice is needed to maintain efficiency and competitiveness. We have years of experience within this sector, and offer advice to sub contractors, main contractors and building and engineering contractors also.
We are completely familiar with the Inland Revenue Construction Industry Schemes, and offer a specialised service for sub contractors seeking a repayment claim with Tax Return Forms each year.
Additionally, we offer a complete service to main contractors with regards to the completion of periodic and annual Returns required by the authorities. Our fees are highly competitive with regards to work carried out within this specialist area dealt with on an agreed fee basis, so all of our clients remain completely satisfied.
Self assessment can be a time consuming and often confusing task for busy individuals. And judging by the hundreds of thousands of taxpayers who are penalized by the Inland Revenue each year it can also be very costly if:
- Deadlines are missed
- Incorrect returns are delivered
- Appropriate records are not retained or presented.
Penalties for late tax returns
Under self-assessment, there is a deadline for getting your tax return to the Inland Revenue - normally 31 January after the end of the tax year. A penalty will be applied if you don't meet this deadline.
Fixed penalties
If your tax return has not been received by 1 February there will be an automatic £100 penalty. There is a second fixed penalty of another £100 if your tax return is still outstanding six months later - 31 July. You can appeal against the fixed penalties but you will have to show that you have just cause for missing the deadline.
Reduction of fixed penalties
If - when the tax return comes in and the correct amount of tax payable at the due date is less than the fixed penalties, then the penalties will be reduced to the amount of the tax that is due.
Daily penalty
The Inland Revenue can ask the Appeal Commissioners to allow them to impose a daily penalty of up to £60 a day. If they do this within six months of the filing date, then we do not impose the second fixed penalty. IR expects to ask for daily penalties only rarely - for example, when they believe that fixed penalties alone will not result in someone filing their return.
Tax based penalty
The Inland Revenue can also impose a penalty based on the amount of tax you owe for the year, if the tax return is still outstanding 12 months after the filing date.
Penalties for late partnership returns
If the time limits for filing a partnership return are not met fixed penalties will arise. And in more substantial cases additional daily penalties may be sought.
The initial fixed penalty will be £100 for each partner who was a member in the partnership during the period covered by the return and will be charged on individual partners not the partnership. If the return is still outstanding 6 months after the filing date there will be a further fixed penalty of £100 per partner unless daily penalties have already been sought.
There is no provision for fixed partnership penalties to be restricted where the tax due on partnership profits is minimal.
In addition to the fixed penalties a daily penalty of up to £60 per relevant partner per day may be imposed if leave is given by the Commissioners. The daily penalties apply for each day on which the failure to file continues following the date that the Commissioners gave leave. As with fixed partnership penalties, daily partnership penalties will be charged on individual partners not the partnership.
Late return and payment - determinations of tax due
If your tax return is late and the Inland Revenue think you have not paid enough tax on time they can estimate the amount of tax they think you should pay. The Inland Revenue calls this a 'determination' of tax due. You can only replace their figure with your own by sending in your completed tax return. You will also be liable to penalties and surcharges.