Mystery Shopping Thread 24 *PLEASE READ THE OP FIRST**PLEASE NO CLIENT NAMES OR FEES

HappyMJ

skivenov wrote: »

It affects your car insurance to a degree if you're using it for work, as it's a change of occupation and you'll need business use if you're using ti for work. It doesn't make a huge difference, but it's better declared to keep you legal as getting knacked for driving without insurance is not money saving.

You would still be covered for the legally required third party insurance whether you told the insurance company it was for social, domestic and pleasure only and ended up doing a business job in it. The comprehensive damage may be affected if you were to make a claim but it's not illegal.

Boredupnorth

Big_Graeme wrote: »

Client!
Please edit your post

DS is not a client is the MS company?

whitelabel

HappyMJ wrote: »

You would still be covered for the legally required third party insurance whether you told the insurance company it was for social, domestic and pleasure only and ended up doing a business job in it. The comprehensive damage may be affected if you were to make a claim but it's not illegal.

are you sure ?

Im sure Ive heard of people being prosecuted by the police for not having insurance, when the car is insured but they are driving to a job, or carrying something etc

so the "its not illegal" bit isnt correct and could lead someone end up on the wrong side of the law.

You must notify your car insurer of any part time job, including MSing, not that it may vary your renewal, but it could.
It cost me £3.50 extra to add business use to my comprehensive policy, providing it wasnt for driving as a professional courier or for hire.
Not worth the risk not to notify insurers under any circumstances.

Yes that also applies to home insurance, but again business use was added free with my contents cover providing it was for working from home and not selling from there or storing items as a long term storage solution... not worth the risk not to notify insurers.
After having my lounge completely flooded last year, right over my working "office desk space" I was grateful that there were no complications.

And yes BG, BUN is right, DS is the MS not the C

and thats enough abbreviations for one day.

Buzby

Depends. Most insurers are interested only if you are actually trading from your address - do customers visit you? If a MSer, the answer is no - you are simply making use of your available time.

Car insurance - is slightly different, but whilst it is your business, you could just as easily be going shopping. I changes markedly when you are obviously giving up your day job to concentrate on MS exclusively.

whitelabel

HappyMJ wrote: »

The HMRC are investigating my claim. The reimbursement can be claimed as an expense and nothing else.....but we've gone through this before and posters on here do not believe this. The HMRC are investigating the claim due to low income declared and a high number of hours declared for working tax credits. I was claiming the hours spent on reimbursement only jobs for tax credits. No hours can be put down for reimbursement only jobs.

A slightly different set of circumstances in your instance then.
Out of interest, did you purposely do reimbursement only jobs to keep your income level low, thus making it eligible for tax credits ?
Im not familiar with the Tax credit system having fortunately never claimed so not sure how they work.

HappyMJ

whitelabel wrote: »

A slightly different set of circumstances in your instance then.
Out of interest, did you purposely do reimbursement only jobs to keep your income level low, thus making it eligible for tax credits ?
Im not familiar with the Tax credit system having fortunately never claimed so not sure how they work.

That was supposed to be the point...to do these and fee paying jobs to get more hours to continue to get working tax credits due to having a part time job and not having enough hours. To get working tax credits you have to do enough hours on work in return for a fee. Searching for jobs doesn't count and as I found out late last year doing the reimbursement only jobs I can't include the hours spent on them either. The work included on a tax credit claim must be paid.

Due to that they decided to look into the tax return as I declared just enough (just under £6,420 profit on all jobs including MS) to get the maximum amount of tax credits. They then said that expenses can only be claimed in return for a fee. The reimbursment didn't count as income and the reimbursement doesn't need to be included on the return as income and if it is only the level of the reimbursement can be claimed as an expense and no more. It's all still being worked out (so far been 8 months with no end in sight) but it looks like I have to increase last tax years (2010-11) income by about £300 which makes me liable for tax for that year.

whitelabel

would the time spent doing reimbursement only jobs be better spent doing the better paid ms jobs and the fees from that be higher than any tax credits and avoid having to claim them at all ? or am i missing a trick and tax credits are some huge amount Im not aware of ?

Big_Graeme

HappyMJ wrote: »

The HMRC are investigating my claim. The reimbursement can be claimed as an expense and nothing else.....but we've gone through this before and posters on here do not believe this. The HMRC are investigating the claim due to low income declared and a high number of hours declared for working tax credits. I was claiming the hours spent on reimbursement only jobs for tax credits. No hours can be put down for reimbursement only jobs.

What is acceptable for tax credits and income tax are not the same at all and you should have made that clear in your post.

For pure income tax purposes the reimbursement is your fee, you would account for it just the same as if you had been paid a fee, it is completely legitimate to put the expenses like parking and travel against that "fee", you can not however put the cost of the goods against it.

Meal is £45, you get a reimbursement of £40, your parking is £2 and your transport is £5, the simple maths would be -

Fee - £40 (You paid £45 but that is your choice to do that) minus £7 expenses means your taxable "profit" is £33.

whitelabel wrote: »

And yes BG, BUN is right, DS is the MS not the C

and thats enough abbreviations for one day.

Ah I thought that was the name of RA's ambulance chasing client.

skivenov

Reimbursement only's not a bad way to grab lunch while you're doing other stuff, and anything it entitles the tax man to give you on the way is never a bad thing.

EG, (effectively) free brew on the road (for example) while I'm about doing my "real job", plus tax reflief for printing 6 pages is always better than a kick in the balls, and if I go a few miles out of my way to do it, all the better!.

Boredupnorth wrote: »

DS is not a client is the MS company?

Geninely wasn't sure what phone shop you meant (I only joined GFK recently), but BG's answerred my question. The new agency is DS.

mskitten2904

oooOOOOOOO you give me fever!!! (Oh I have something for that)

Spent nearly all day doing RA calls and I missed out on the ESA clothes shops *gutted* Can anyone see anything pending for tomorrow by any chance? at all :-(