Confused about how this would work if self employed ???

Amanda65

Hi all

OH had notice of redundancy today . It's been on the cards for the past couple of months and his employers have made all sorts of noises about redeployment but it, not surprisingly with their track record, has come to nothing. Luckily OH has been making contingency plans and has his CV out for a number of vacancies etc. but is also quite keen to see this as an opportunity and use his contacts and skills to start up on his own - however this is where my confusion is regarding benefits etc.

Current situation is that I work (30 hours per week) and earn a reasonable salary but not enough to keep us afloat. We have 3 children

• eldest, 19 is in first year at university receiving a loan for her tuition fees and a maintenance loan although not full amount due to our combined incomes so we are currently contributing £125 per month to her accommodation. We did not give details of our income when she applied for her student finance as SFE advised that if our household income was over £57K (?) per annum she would not receive any grants etc. so it wasn't worth it
• middle DD is doing her A-levels this year and hoping to go to university on September. Haven't yet started student finance application yet
• Youngest (DS) is in Yr 10

The younger two children are both at private schools (not that it makes much difference but just a bit of an explanation as to why mu income doesn't cover our outgoings). We have very few savings and OH will get around £2400 redundancy on top of a months salary so we are OK until end of May.

So to finally get round to my questions, if he does go it alone we have no idea what his income will be so how do we declare anything to DWP for WTC / CTC and to SFE? Should we contact all these agencies now ? I am just a little confused as to how it works out for self employed people :doh:

Hammyman

If he does it properly, he will have done a business plan so should have an estimate of what he thinks his first years income is. That is the figure you give to the various people. Then once the year end books are done, you update them with the actual figure or if it becomes apparent during the years trading that the actual figures are likely to be way out from the estimated, you give Tax Credits a revised estimate.

Jowo_2

Amanda65 wrote: »

..
So to finally get round to my questions, if he does go it alone we have no idea what his income will be so how do we declare anything to DWP for WTC / CTC and to SFE? Should we contact all these agencies now ? I am just a little confused as to how it works out for self employed people :doh:

Business Link is his first port of call - this will help him produce the business plan that will determine if his business is viable and help estimate his income (Scottish Enterprise business gateway if in Scotland).

Amanda65

He has a business plan - and ironically Business Link will be one of his clients as he has been working for them as a consultant for his current employers. I wasn't sure if you could use estimated figures for benefits etc. so thank you for that.