Maximising income - Mystery Shopping? Surveys? (Part Two)

Zazen999

Re: proofreading
Put it into google; i think the people you are looking for are chapterhouse, they have advertised for years and come up in the first 3 if you google it.

TractorGirl327

Zazen999 wrote: »

Hi Tractorgirl
'When you talk about "Expenses", do you mean the amount you've had to pay out to to the job - ie the buying of the burger etc - or does this also include petrol to get to & from the job, car parking etc?'

You need to keep these things separate:
The fee is what you have been paid; the total monies recieved include expenses so you need to also record:
Expenses; so what you spent [that is part of the deal, so the maximum they are going to reimburse you for food etc]. This gets offset so that you are taxed on the fee only
Mileage; you can claim mileage and travel costs - this also gets offset
Paper; you need to find out the average cost of a sheet of paper that you print out and you can offset this amount. It changes per printer so go to the website for that printer's make and it should tell you.
You can also claim a proportion of the cost of running the business from home; calculate as a percentage of the number of rooms, plus the amount of time you spend at the business and you can also offset some monies there.

Be aware though, that you should also state the amount of money earned from interest from any work done; so if you earned for example £200 through MS and £1000 through other income, and earned £5 in interest in that period, you would have to state that £1 was earned in interest on that money; and declare it. [interest rates just to make the maths easy, don't come back at me for inaccurate rates of interest please]. It is usually pretty negligible but the taxman can come back at you if you don't declare it.
All this is from the workshop, I don't think they get too hung up on those that earn less than £15k, but i have other earnings under self employed, plus a full time job so i need to know the basics to keep a clean sheet.

Wow, thank you very much for taking the time to reply so fully.

I don't have any other job apart from MS-ing so I'm pretty certain I'm not gonna be liable for tax, so I'm not that bothered about claiming for petrol or carparking, or use of home (I don't HAVE to claim them, do I??) but I do want to make sure I get the fee/expenses bit right. I amended my spreadsheet yesterday to keep the 2 figures separate.

Thanks again. I appreciate it.

TG327

Zazen999

deleted text due to being misadvised by tax office

charl8888

Hi
I am filling out my self assessment tax return online for MS for the first time and was wondering if anyone could help me...I am employed as well as self employed but my with my employment I am on PAYE. Do I have to fill in the 'employment' forms on the tax return as well as the 'self employment' one? Hope this makes sense!

Timmne

Yes you do - fill in every section of the main form you need to as well....

Remember to include your bank interest received on the relevant page - this includes all interest received into any of your accounts (don't include ISA interest), including your MS interest if you keep a seperate account. This is contrary to the bottom part of post 972 above - interest received is not taxable as a part of a trade, in your case MSing. So if you keep a seperate account for MS money then include interest received in your main return, not your SE return.

PM me if you need any specific help - that goes to anyone! (I'm an accountant)

uphillstruggle_2

jpwhittle wrote: »

my dad came up with a great sugestion to make extra cash yesterday if you like reading. has anyone considered doing proofreading? if your already self employed youd be ok my dad says he knows quite a few people that do it and really enjoy it. imagine never having to pay for a book again.
the bad thing is a used to always see vacancies advertised and now im interested cant find what im looking for. does anyone know where to start or is anyone interested in it?
pauline

Proofreading really appeals to me. I work in Marketing and there is an element of proofreading in it but I dont have a qualification. After reading Chapter House's website it looks like you need to do a course before you can do any work?

TractorGirl327

What really annoys me about Gap is, they are always on at us to make sure our spelling and punctuation is correct and theirs is ****

I'm just searching the list of suburbs and the inaccuracies and inconsistencies on there are unbelievable! I know they are round the other side of the world and can't be expected to know the name of every town and village in the UK but surely they must have it written down on their brief and all they need to is copy?

A few examples of what I mean:

Ashton : Ashton under Lye : Ashton-Under-Lyne : Ashton-Under-Lyme

Barrow in Furness : Barrow-In-Furness

Bexley : Bexley Heath : Bexleyheath

Burton on Trent : Burton upon Trent : Burton-On-Trent

Clacton : Clacton on Sea : Clacton Upon Sea : Clacton-On-Sea

Loads more but you get the jist ........

And then you find "167 New Road" or "High Street" or "London Road" so you have to select it in case it's the High Street or London Road near you and of course it's not, it's the other side of the country

Also, some are in upper case and some in lower. Don't they tell us NEVER TO USE UPPER CASE???

They need someone to sort it out because searching for jobs is getting more and more time consuming!

OK, I'm getting off my soapbox now!!

TG

sirprize

mystery shopping seems like a really great way to build a second income. I have been on the other side of it on a regular basis and many managers bonuses are linked to MS performance.

jo1972

Just been checking my payments for the last 2 months from GAP.

I've been paid £44 but I've looked at my completed assignments and it should be £67.

I emailed them using the form on the website but they're not going to reply are they

If they have a problem with a report you've sent in, do they follow it up or just not pay you or tell you? I don't even know which ones I've been paid for or not.

Timmne

If you send in an enquiry you'll get a reply, possibly from Matt who is brilliant. I got paid on Monday and had the discrepancies sorted by last night!