Self employed/sole trader

anglosaxon1966

Good evening all. Please excuse me if I am wrong...the way I read Rishi Sunak's statement is that all self employed people will be able to claim Universal Credit at the rate of SSP.
This rate is £94 per week. Is this correct please ??

calcotti

All self employed people will not have the minimum income floor applied. This means they will not be treated as having income they are not actually receiving.

The UC standard allowance is increasing and was stated as being equivalent to SSP which is £94.25/week (increasing in April). I haven't seen the exact figures yet, the announcement of an increase of £1,000/year wouldn't, according to my calculation, quite match SSP.

this doesn't mean that every self employed person will receive this amount. The figure is used to calculate the maximum Uc that could be payable. The actual amount payable will depend on other circumstances such as other household income and/or savings.

streetwork

I find it extremely confusing.  I am self employed for the last 6 years having paid tax and national insurance for this period.  I now have zero income due to contracts being cancelled over the virus and do not know when I will work again.
I do have savings and get a military pension.  This places me above the means test threshold, but not certain for how long.  Employed are to get 80% of their wage paid by the government, I cannot get anything until I have exhausted savings (which is for retirement plans), yet employed people are not asked about savings or other income.  Why??
We don't have to pay on account this year, but this will be added to the January bill anyway, ok, that gives me 2.3K to play with, or not, as its allocated for the next self assessment payment.  Do I use this to cover living??
I think if the national insurance is repaid from the last 2 years and no national insurance is due for this tax year it would help.  I am essentially paying employed people up to 2.5K a month and being penalised for doing it...
Any thoughts to how Government should better treat us??

mattyprice4004

I’m self employed and in a similar situation - unfortunately it’s common knowledge that self employment is more risky than regular employment, and as such we’re all going to struggle. 

Best of luck, but I don’t think the Government are being particularly unfair - even though it directly affects me. 

streetwork

Logged into HMRC today and looks like I have a refund due, should I claim it or leave it there for January 2021 tax payment?  The refund equates to about 60% of one months usual income before tax, etc.  At the moment I am using saving from past redundancy and a small pension to live on, but this will not last until January 2021 and then I will need to pay 2019/20 tax bill which is covered separately so do not want to dip into this, but may have no choice if government are not going to step in.
What to do???

Jeremy535897

If you completed a SA100 tax return and provided details of the bank account you wanted a refund paid to, it should happen automatically. If the refund is left, it may well accrue interest (depending on what year the refund is for) at 0.5% (non-taxable). However, don't assume that if you ask for it today, it will arrive tomorrow! I gave up one year after six months of asking, and just deducted it from next year's payment.

66_65BOW

Hi I am a Self Employed Sole Trader in the cleaning industry and only paid for cleans that are carried out I employee 4 people on sage accounts last monday a contract was closed due to virus, the person working there works 2 jobs for me so still was working but obviously lower wage, but yesterday informed me that they were putting health first self isolating and stopped working last night, but have demanded that i pay them 80% wages as per gov information to them.  I am self employed i can not get a grant or any other financial help whatsoever, how do i do this when there is no income from the contract that closed TIA

Jeremy535897

It is for you to decide whether to apply for the coronavirus job retention scheme and furlough some or all of your employees. This leads to all sorts of problems where you would basically be giving one person a paid holiday at 80% of normal wage, and telling another to pick up the first person's work and do a full day's work for 100%. Your employee has no right to call for you to apply to the scheme. If they decide to withdraw their labour when not ill or looking after anyone else they will presumably be in breach of their contract of employment. 

Mistral001

66_65BOW said:

Hi I am a Self Employed Sole Trader in the cleaning industry and only paid for cleans that are carried out I employee 4 people on sage accounts last monday a contract was closed due to virus, the person working there works 2 jobs for me so still was working but obviously lower wage, but yesterday informed me that they were putting health first self isolating and stopped working last night, but have demanded that i pay them 80% wages as per gov information to them.  I am self employed i can not get a grant or any other financial help whatsoever, how do i do this when there is no income from the contract that closed TIA

Sole traders with employees are probably going to be the hardest hit.  They will have to find the money for paying their employees 80% of their wage from their own personal funds.  I feel for you.  There must be hundreds of thousands of people like you in the same situation.

66_65BOW

Mistral001 said:

66_65BOW said:

Hi I am a Self Employed Sole Trader in the cleaning industry and only paid for cleans that are carried out I employee 4 people on sage accounts last monday a contract was closed due to virus, the person working there works 2 jobs for me so still was working but obviously lower wage, but yesterday informed me that they were putting health first self isolating and stopped working last night, but have demanded that i pay them 80% wages as per gov information to them.  I am self employed i can not get a grant or any other financial help whatsoever, how do i do this when there is no income from the contract that closed TIA

Sole traders with employees are probably going to be the hardest hit.  They will have to find the money for paying their employees 80% of their wage from their own personal funds.  I feel for you.  There must be hundreds of thousands of people like you in the same situation.

This is most disturbing i operate on a month to month income from invoice to pay wage and products there simply is no money personal or business

Mistral001

66_65BOW said:

Mistral001 said:

66_65BOW said:

Hi I am a Self Employed Sole Trader in the cleaning industry and only paid for cleans that are carried out I employee 4 people on sage accounts last monday a contract was closed due to virus, the person working there works 2 jobs for me so still was working but obviously lower wage, but yesterday informed me that they were putting health first self isolating and stopped working last night, but have demanded that i pay them 80% wages as per gov information to them.  I am self employed i can not get a grant or any other financial help whatsoever, how do i do this when there is no income from the contract that closed TIA

Sole traders with employees are probably going to be the hardest hit.  They will have to find the money for paying their employees 80% of their wage from their own personal funds.  I feel for you.  There must be hundreds of thousands of people like you in the same situation.

This is most disturbing i operate on a month to month income from invoice to pay wage and products there simply is no money personal or business

The Government will pay the 80%, but when?  The process of getting the 80% I am not sure of so you might have to pay it out of your own funds until you get it from the Government