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

1luckystar

Hi all, just a quick question about Esa job click and collect is it self allocating or does it go to applications ? thanks.

littleange

If reimbursement only job reimbursements have to be counted as income, surely those hours spent earning that income would be legitimate working hours?

tizzy79

Hi. I just started recentley doing visits for RA. Can someone help me and advise when their payroll, cut off dates etc runs please. TIA x

Freeya

Hi fellow MSers. Hope things are picking up it seems to be a bit quiet lately!
There seems to be a bit of confusion with reimbursement only jobs and what you can claim as an expense. I just want to try and clrify things for myself as a relative newbie still.
If I were to accept a 'meal and drink' job for £15.00 reimbursement, no fee, and I spend exactly £15.00, would this mean I could put my profit as £0? Or would I put my profit as £15.00 as I have gotten a meal out of the job? The only reason i'm confused is because financially, i'm not gaining anything from this job so don't really understand what I would be paying tax on and in fact could be losing money on petrol etc....
I'm still new so haven't completed any tax forms yet and want to make sure that when I have to, everything is correct.

misssarahleigh

From the OP. Just for clarification of what was said for all those looking and wondering why we are making funny comments.

Originally Posted by misssarahleigh
From the horses mouth (anthony and his department at HMRC)

Taxable Expenses

If the breif required you to purchase said products in order to be paid a fee, the products are 'incidental benifits' and can be classified as an allowable expense.

Reinbursment only

You cannot argue you have done the job for a fee. You have taken on the job and recieved goods for that job. Therefore payment in kind and is taxable.

If you can argue and prove that this was only done in order to gain access to fee paying jobs or build a reputation with the company, this will more likley depend on the strength of your argument. No set right/wrong to this, but based on individual circumstances.

Taking on reinbursment only jobs and classifying it as an expense is not allowed. If you do this purposly to lower your profit margin, he was clear in that it would be classified as Tax Evasion.

This is the answer I have received but please note this is not set in stone and very much open to interpretation.

I believe the difference in opinions is due to the fact there is no right or wrong answer for SOME of the situations we come across.

As previously said, i think it depends on your interpretation. i.e. i order a pizza and right it off as a taxable expense to get a fee. If the fee was £10 its clear I was doing it for the money. If the fee was £1, common sense would say i wouldn't go to all that trouble for £1 fee. But I would for the benifit of the pizza.

It's a grey area and in fairness i think it's down to the person who looks at your accounts if your ever audited.

So long as you can justify what you have done, and feel that your happy explaining why you have done that, then consider the matter closed.

Freeya

You would classify the £15 as income, but cannot say your expenses were £15. You got that money for the meal, which is why you did the job. You didn't eat the meal to obtain £20 (making it a byproduct of getting the fee and possible for reinbursment).

Think of reinbursment only jobs as 'payment in kind'. Which you are taxed on.

Freeya

Thank you for making things clearer for me

JohnnyG

tizzy79 wrote: »

Hi. I just started recentley doing visits for RA. Can someone help me and advise when their payroll, cut off dates etc runs please. TIA x

Hi tizzy, sorry, whilst I've done a few jobs for them recently, I'm still waiting on payment. Just checked page 1 and there's no details of payment on there.

Anyone else know RA's cut off dates/pay date?

Cheers

Big_Graeme

1luckystar wrote: »

Hi all, just a quick question about Esa job click and collect is it self allocating or does it go to applications ? thanks.

They do both, if the jobs don't show in your inbox right away it means they are using applications rather than self allocating, it isn't clear where and when they use each method as it is with other agencies.

Boredupnorth

RA usual pay at the beginning of the month. Never established any real cut off pattern for them but it seems to be work done anytime month one is paid first week of month 2

HappyMJ

Freeya wrote: »

Hi fellow MSers. Hope things are picking up it seems to be a bit quiet lately!
There seems to be a bit of confusion with reimbursement only jobs and what you can claim as an expense. I just want to try and clrify things for myself as a relative newbie still.
If I were to accept a 'meal and drink' job for £15.00 reimbursement, no fee, and I spend exactly £15.00, would this mean I could put my profit as £0? Or would I put my profit as £15.00 as I have gotten a meal out of the job? The only reason i'm confused is because financially, i'm not gaining anything from this job so don't really understand what I would be paying tax on and in fact could be losing money on petrol etc....
I'm still new so haven't completed any tax forms yet and want to make sure that when I have to, everything is correct.

I am now (after being in discussions with my local tax office) either not including reimbursement jobs on the tax return and if reimbursement jobs are included due to mixed up with fee paying jobs then I only include the level of reimbursement as an expense making the profit £0. No longer putting mileage down to get to/from the location...nor the costs of printing the pages.

I suppose it depends who you get in the tax office.

The penalty to me is to decrease my annual mileage by about 750 miles in that tax year which increases my profit by £300. Tax is 20% so I have to pay them £60 for that year. No further penalty has been applied at this point.

littleange wrote: »

If reimbursement only job reimbursements have to be counted as income, surely those hours spent earning that income would be legitimate working hours?

That's what I would have thought.

I have been allowed to claim the reimbursement as an expense or to not include the reimbursement as income. Not sure why everyone insists that I can't but hey ho...pay more tax. What has been disallowed on my claim is the mileage to get to/from the restaurant/hotel to get the reimbursement. I always used to claim mileage and now been told I can't.

And....the tax credit department ended up not caring and haven't claimed anything back.