Using a family member to help reduce tax bill.

silvercar

Grumpy_chap said:

evosy1978 said:

Sorry. Its my 13 year old son. I would pay him below tx and ni threshold. I was under the impression he can do 2 hours an evening.  Legally. It would be paperwork. 

 I'm thinking of doing this with the sole intention of saving me money on paying the high tax rate as I will earn more than that this year .  I do my own tax returns online.

Thanks

You can't do this solely to save your money on the higher rate tax threshold.
You actually need to pay the money to your son who actually needs to do the work.
It cannot be just a paper exercise to record an expense that is fictitious.
Having been paid the money, your son can do as he wishes with it whether it is something you approve of or not.

I suspect that the 13 yr old would then be charged 'board' to return most of the money to the family budget.

Jeremy535897

silvercar said:

Grumpy_chap said:

evosy1978 said:

Sorry. Its my 13 year old son. I would pay him below tx and ni threshold. I was under the impression he can do 2 hours an evening.  Legally. It would be paperwork. 

 I'm thinking of doing this with the sole intention of saving me money on paying the high tax rate as I will earn more than that this year .  I do my own tax returns online.

Thanks

You can't do this solely to save your money on the higher rate tax threshold.
You actually need to pay the money to your son who actually needs to do the work.
It cannot be just a paper exercise to record an expense that is fictitious.
Having been paid the money, your son can do as he wishes with it whether it is something you approve of or not.

I suspect that the 13 yr old would then be charged 'board' to return most of the money to the family budget.

Why would the 13 year old do the work then? Pressure? In addition, you can't charge your own son for his maintenance. That's your obligation as a parent. There's nothing wrong with him using the money to buy things like clothes he specifically wants, or computer games the parent wouldn't have bought him.

unforeseen

Have you read 
https://www.gov.uk/child-employment/restrictions-on-child-employment 

Grumpy_chap

silvercar said:

I suspect that the 13 yr old would then be charged 'board' to return most of the money to the family budget.

Jeremy535897 said:

Why would the 13 year old do the work then? Pressure? In addition, you can't charge your own son for his maintenance. That's your obligation as a parent. There's nothing wrong with him using the money to buy things like clothes he specifically wants, or computer games the parent wouldn't have bought him.

I mentioned the issue of the 13 yo needing to actually do the work and be paid the money because there have been previous threads where people suggest "employing" their two-year-old or saving the company money on deposit in the child's name to avoid income tax.
Clearly, in the case of a two-year-old, the child is not doing the work and the whole thing is contrived for the sake of paying less tax.  When does tax avoidance become tax evasion?

In the case of a 13-year-old, this is all rather more marginal and it is possible that the 13 yo could be doing the work in a proper arrangement and be properly paid at an appropriate rate and subject to working time restrictions.  As Jeremy said, why would the 13yo do the work if not paid?

silvercar

Grumpy_chap said:

In the case of a 13-year-old, this is all rather more marginal and it is possible that the 13 yo could be doing the work in a proper arrangement and be properly paid at an appropriate rate and subject to working time restrictions.  As Jeremy said, why would the 13yo do the work if not paid?

Plenty kids muck in with family businesses; I suspect most kids brought up on farms do this without even considering it work.