Self-Assessment Help!

Tracyc_2

Hiya

I wonder if anyone can help. I am a legal secretary and I work from home on a self-employed basis for an outsourcing firm. I am doing my self-assessment for the first time and am stuck!

The problem I have is what I can claim for and the percentage of which I can claim. I know I can claim for heating, lighting, phone, broadband, insurance and Council tax. I also believe I can claim for the mortgage interest but was advised by HMRC that if I did this I would have problems when selling the house so I have decided to steer clear of this. The lady I spoke to told me that I can work out what percentage to claim by going off floor space or rooms in the house, I decided to use the rooms. I have 5 rooms in the house, not including the bathroom and hallway.

I use the room for work from around 9 until about 6 or sometimes 7 (with the odd break) although I have been known to work longer.

So what I need to know is what percentage can I claim. The lady used an example of 4 rooms and something about 1/8 but then said that if I was to claim 50% of useage for work that wouldnt be considered as unreasonble. So what I want to know is can I claim 50% of bills or is it 1/5 (as we have 5 rooms). Confused... you will be!! Please help as all this is worrying me!!

Thanks in advance

Tracy

anselld

I would think she meant 50% of usage of one room so 1/10 (10%) of overall costs. I think if you start having a room 100% business use you can potentially become liable for CGT.

Things like telephone, broadband, etc could be split by a different percentage depending on what you think a fair split of usage is.

Ianh82

i run a small it firm from home in my spare time and i called them and she gave me the difficult calculations or i could use the amount they allow of £3 per week for heating, lighting, broadband etc etc. you can of course work it out to the penny but if you claims loads they would question it.

CrazyChris

Ianh82 wrote: »

i run a small it firm from home in my spare time and i called them and she gave me the difficult calculations or i could use the amount they allow of £3 per week for heating, lighting, broadband etc etc. you can of course work it out to the penny but if you claims loads they would question it.

If you can back up any claims that you make then you would probably be fine, for example if you could prove that the only phone calls made from the house phone are for work purposes then you could claim the whole lot - but any such records would have to be kept for a number of years to meet your legal requirement!

gkerr4

use the £3 a week amount (i think i used £2 this time)

the calculation of actuals is very difficult and if you try and go too high a % you can end up being assessed fro business rates on your property!

also - it's not rooms, its floorspace in sq/m - do you know what % of floorspace your office is?

Tracyc_2

anselld wrote: »

I would think she meant 50% of usage of one room so 1/10 (10%) of overall costs. I think if you start having a room 100% business use you can potentially become liable for CGT.

Things like telephone, broadband, etc could be split by a different percentage depending on what you think a fair split of usage is.

Thanks very much for this, I think I get it now. I'm not going to bother with having the room for 100% as I'm a transcriptionist for an outsourcing firm, its not like I run my own business and I certainly don't earn mega bucks!

Tracyc_2

Ianh82 wrote: »

i run a small it firm from home in my spare time and i called them and she gave me the difficult calculations or i could use the amount they allow of £3 per week for heating, lighting, broadband etc etc. you can of course work it out to the penny but if you claims loads they would question it.

Thanks for this, they told me the same thing, but I am working for long hours nearly every day so I think if I try and work it out the other way I would be entitled to more. Obviously I wouldnt try and claim more than is reasonable.

Tracyc_2

CrazyChris wrote: »

If you can back up any claims that you make then you would probably be fine, for example if you could prove that the only phone calls made from the house phone are for work purposes then you could claim the whole lot - but any such records would have to be kept for a number of years to meet your legal requirement!

Thanks for this, I see what you mean, I dont really know how I can back it up with actual paperwork as I use the broadband for at least 8 hours a day just for work purposes, same with the electricity etc. I'm not sure how I could prove on paper that this is what I use but I dont think £3 a week covers what I use.

Tracyc_2

gkerr4 wrote: »

use the £3 a week amount (i think i used £2 this time)

the calculation of actuals is very difficult and if you try and go too high a % you can end up being assessed fro business rates on your property!

also - it's not rooms, its floorspace in sq/m - do you know what % of floorspace your office is?

I wouldnt be claiming for anything that wasnt reasonable, but I see what you mean. The lady at the HMRC gave me two options, she said I can calculate using floor space or rooms, so I thought rooms would be easier. Might just use the £3 a week then, its going up to £4 a week for this tax year she said.

danny2k80

Hi, I'm hoping someone can help me with regards to a tax return.
My twin brother has been sent the "you need to complete a tax return" letter by hmrc and so he has gone.online and completed it with UK income for the tax year, however this is where it gets confusing as for the 2011/2012 tax year he was living in Spain and only came to the UK for a total of. 30 days in the tax year. He was advised to submit a SA109 form, however I'm not sure this is the correct form as he has no foreign income he wishes to remit but he does wish to advise hmrc that he isn't living in the UK.
My questions are:
1. For the UK income he earned should the complete the online return as normal and submit
2. He wishes to.inform the hmrc that he wasn't in the UK in the previous tax year and won't be for the near future, which form does he need to complete bearing in mind that he had an income in Spain where he was during the last tax year and he is paying tax on that income to Spain and noe in this current tax year he is living and working in Germany and paying tax to Germany.
3. By submitting the form from question 2 will the hmrc have him down as out of the country and not require him to submit a tax return for this current or future tax years
Any help that people can provide will be greatly appreciated.


Regards,


Daniel