registering for self-employment

Hoolibooli

Could anyone help me out with a self employment question?
Since leaving Uni in the summer my son is helping his mate with his gardening business for about 3 months until he looks for a permanent job. He is being paid cash, does he have to register as self employed (which seems quite excessive) or can he just declare the income as casual? It will be a one off as he won't be doing it for more than 3 months. No tax will be liable anyway as it will still be well within his personal allowance.
Any help will be appreciated
Thanks

Darksparkle

Depends if he is genuinely self employed or his mates employee. They can't choose which, it depends on the terms of the engagement.

Hoolibooli

His mates business is genuine (tax paid and whatever), so in terms of this he IS being employed but to register as self-employed for just a 3 month engagement seems overly complicated, surely a declaration of casual income would be OK!

Darksparkle

Hoolibooli wrote: »

His mates business is genuine (tax paid and whatever), so in terms of this he IS being employed but to register as self-employed for just a 3 month engagement seems overly complicated, surely a declaration of casual income would be OK!

It's not about whether his mates business is genuine, it's about whether your son is employed by his mate.

HMRC have an employment status indicator tool he can use.

If he is employed then he wouldn't register for self assessment, his employer (his mate) would put his pay through PAYE (depending on amounts).

vegasvisitor

Yes, really what you need to know is whether he is being put though as employed by the friend in his business. If he is not being put through as employed, then yes he will need to register as self employed. It's not that difficult. He could do it all online. Basically at the end of it he would then fill in a self-assessment. This is basically just recording income and expenses. This could actually save him money, as he could put his travel under expenses. Although you say this is short term, he could go into full time employment for the rest of the year, so would need to cover off these earnings. If he won't get a P45, then he would need to declare it as self-employed.