New Location!

This Blog has now been moved to become part of my website here: www.lilyirisbookkeeping.co.uk

Sales Process Workshop - SOS

On Monday I attended the monthly Business Inspired supportive business group in Downend like I try to every month. It's a lovely group of women that get together each month to share experiences and listen to a presentation from a local business about that months chosen topic. May - Sales.

I was a bit apprehensive about going as I really dislike 'selling' and don't like to do it. But I went anyway and met the lovely Karen Dunne-Squire from Sales Outsourcing Specialists. She did a fantastic 45 minute presentation on Sales Process Planning and about half way through I had one of those 'ah-ha' moments....you know the ones, where you want to slap your forehead and go oh my god, it's that straight forward!

At the end of the evening Karen offered one lucky member of the group a free place on her Sales Process Workshop today. I was lucky enough to receive this fantastic prize and couldn't wait to go and expand on all the 'seeds' Karen had planted.

So of I went to Easton Business Centre this morning (as an aside, this is a great place and has a good conference room that we were in) for a 10am start. I was joined by 4 other business owners and a member of Karen's own staff to learn about my sales process, how it should look and how to bridge the gap. We covered a whole manner of things from what my customer 'looks like', to the stages my customer go through to do business with me all the way through to connecting with potential clients and strategic partners.

Now I'm not going to give any of Karen's tips and secrets as a) I'd be sat here all night recalling them and b) she is such a fantastic trainer you should all just go on her course! What I will say is this, if you feel as though you are stuck not getting new clients and could do with help reviewing your sales process give Karen a call. I was one of those naive business owners that thought sales or marketing or IT specialists were for big companies and not sole traders like me. Actually, there are companies out there especially for businesses like mine and they are affordable. Go search them out and make use of them!

The Next Generation

I read an article in the paper recently about school girls who have camped outside a London hotel so they can get a glimpse of Justin Bieber. Now I know I’m a bit too old to appreciate the lure of this 18 year old pop star but surely the parents of these children should be making sure they are in school?

The girls interviewed ranged from 11 to 16 and some admitted to missing revision for their GCSE’s as seeing Mr Bieber was more important. This article coupled with another about a company that employed 7 benefit claimants that didn’t turn up to their first day of work, got me thinking. 

What will this country be like in 15-20 years time when these people are part of the generation running our country? We’re supposedly in another recession but I can’t help thinking that our leniency on the younger generations makes the situation worse.......comparing my parents upbringing to today the gulf is massive.

Mike Nelmes Charity Golf Day

Bit of a break from the norm for me, blogging personal instead of business!

For the last 3 years my husband and I have organised the Mike Nelmes Charity Golf Day in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support.

My father in law died January 2004, 3 months before I met my husband, so I never had the pleasure of meeting him. My husband spent years trying to decide how best to celebrate his father's life. After many discussions with family he decided on a charity golf day.

Now my father in law never played golf but he enjoyed sport and had always encouraged his children and grandchildren to participate. My husband had not long taken up golf so we decided it was the perfect combination. 

So in 2009 the 1st Mike Nelmes Charity Golf Day was played, 12 teams and 1,000 raffle tickets and our first donation was made.


Over the last 3 years we have raised a massive £6,815 and you can see details of all our antics at www.mikenelmescharitygolfday.co.uk

 
This year we want to up the bar a little and top the £10,000! Our golf day is, again, being held at Thornbury Golf Centre and is on Friday 1st June only this year we are adding a summer party to the evening in order for the non-golfers to join us.

Each year to raise the donations we ask golfers to play, local business to sponsor holes, donate raffle prizes or sponsor the trophies and we ask anyone and everyone we know to buy raffle tickets.

We have asked the same again this year and have been overwhelmed by the response. At the time of writing we have 17 teams, 8 hole sponsors, the trophies have been sponsored, 43 party tickets sold, 8 brilliant raffle prizes and free printing of our golf day program.

We have £1,665.25 raised to add to the £6,815 making the running total £8,480.....only £1,520 to go!!!!

Teams and hole sponsors need to be in by Mon 30th April but raffle tickets and summer party tickets will be on sale right up to 1st June.

To see full details of the run up to this years golf day please visit www.mikenelmescharitygolfday.co.uk/blog or visit our Facebook page www.facebook.com/mikenelmescharitygolfday

Maternity Pay & Child Benefit & Tax Credits

One of my self employed clients is about to have her first child and I've been looking into the following for her, so though I would share.

Maternity Pay for the Self Employed

When you are employed you may be entitled to Statutory Maternity Pay from your employer. When you are self employed you may be entitled to Maternity Allowance.

If you’re registered self employed and paying class 2 NI contributions, or have a small earning certificate, you might get Maternity Allowance. You may be eligible if you’ve been employed and/or self employed for at least 26 in the 66 weeks up to and including the week before your baby is due.

You must also earn an average minimum of £30 per week in each of the 26 weeks.

Maternity Allowance will be paid up to a maximum of 39 weeks but what you receive will depend on your earnings. If you average earnings is less than 90% of £128.73 you will receive the lower figure, if you earnings are over £128.73 you will receive £128.73 per week.

You can claim maternity allowance when you reach the 14^th week before your baby is due (week 27) by completing the MA1 pack. You can request it from your Jobcentre our download it here: http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/ma1.pdf

There are been a few changed to Child Tax Credits and Child Benefit for this tax year.

Child Tax Credits
From 6th April 2012 the limits have lowered. The HMRC have given out the following rough guide. If you earn
- over £26,000 and you have one child
- or over £32,200and you have two children
you might not get child tax credit. However this does depend on your circumstances as you may still be entitled if you pay for registered or approved childcare or your child has a disability.

For the most accurate calculation contact the HMRC, or you can get an estimate by using the calculator on the HMRC website here.

Child Benefit
Child benefit is paid to anyone responsible for a child under 16 or under 20 and still in certain full time education. You get paid £20.30 per week for the first child and £13.40 per week for any other children.

However, child benefit is being gradually removed for any household earning over £50,000 per year. This will be reduced by implementing a tax charge on the tax payer for earning between £50,000 and £60,000. Over £60,000 you will loose child benefit completely.

This comes into effect from the 2012-12 tax year and will effect child benefit paid in the period 7th Jan 2013 to the end of the tax year.

National Insurance

National Insurance contributions you make contribute to you being able to claim incapacity allowance, maternity allowance and basic state pension. 

When you are self employed you pay Class 2 contributions of £2.65 (20112/13) per week, but they don’t have to be paid if you earn below £5,595 as a sole trader (2012/13). However, if you don’t pay these contributions make sure you understand that you will be giving up rights to incapacity allowance and maternity allowance, and possibly basic state pension. 

Currently, you need 30 years of NI contributions to make the state pension, so be careful that you will reach this if you have a year or two out of the NI system. If you are claiming Child Benefit for children under 12, you should still receive credits towards your state pension.

End of 2011/12 Tax Year

The end of the tax year is almost upon us so I thought I would identify a few key points for the new tax year.

Rates

From 6^th April 2012 you are now able to earn £8,105 before paying any tax and then pay 20% tax up to £34,370.

For national insurance it’s slightly different. For self employed you have to pay Class 2 at £2.65 per week and Class 4 at 9% above £7,605.

Regulations

The HMRC has got stricter on what can and can’t be claimed as costs by sole traders. Below is a list of a couple of things that are not allowable:

1. Client/Supplier Entertaining – as more and more trips and sporting events are being offset the HMRC has now disallowed all entertaining

2. Gifts – Gifts to customers are only allowable if they cost less than £50 and are promoting your product or service

3. Work Clothes – disallowed on the basis that they have dual purpose, the need to be warm and decent (!) as well as for business purpose

4. Food or Drink away from home – on the basis that you would pay to feed and water yourself if you were employed any food or drink you buy is not allowable

Tips

1. If you claim child tax credits you will need to complete the required forms by 31 July. By completing your self assessment tax return as soon as possible after 5^th April you can give accurate actual amounts

2. Is your partner employed? Make the most of employer provided benefits, especially childcare vouchers

3. Don’t forget retirement planning, for every £8 you put into a pension HMRC will contribute £2. Consult an IFA for best advice (I can recommend one if you don’t have one)

4. Record keeping – HMRC can investigate your tax return at any time and may request to see up to 6 years worth of information. Make sure you keep all original invoices, receipts, cheque book stubs and paying in book stubs as well as bank statements. If these aren’t available the HMRC may charge a penalty.

If you would like to have these items emailed to you in future drop me a line to be added to the list.

HMRC Tax Update

The HMRC releases periodic updates reminding tax payers of deadlines and associated penalties for missing those deadlines. The latest communication includes:

Construction Industry Scheme (CIS)
If you are a contractor under the CIS scheme you will send a monthly return to HMRC telling them about payments you have made in the last month.
This return has to be submitted by the 19th of the month.

If this deadline is missed the following penalties will apply:

Length of delay	Penalty you will have to pay
1 day late	A fixed penalty of £100. This applies even if your return has no subcontractors on it - a nil return.
2 months late	A fixed penalty of £200. This applies even if your return has no subcontractors on it - a nil return.
6 months late	£300 or 5% of the CIS deductions shown on the return, whichever is the higher. This is as well as the penalties above.
12 months late	£300 or 5% of the CIS deductions shown on the return, whichever is the higher. In serious cases you may be asked to pay up to £3,000 or 100% of the CIS deductions shown on the return, whichever is the higher. These are as well as the penalties above.

PAYE Payments
If you are an employer you will deduct tax and national insurance from your employees and these need to be paid over to HMRC by the 22nd of the month following the month of payment. I.e. Tax and NI deducted from salary paid in November needs to be paid to HMRC by 22nd December.



If this payment date falls on a weekend or bank holiday the funds must be cleared with HMRC on the last business day before.

If the deadline is missed the following penalties apply:

No. of times payments are late in a tax year	Penalty percentage	Amount to which penalty percentages apply
1	No penalty (as long as the payment is less than six months late)	Total amount that is late in the tax year (ignoring the first late payment in that tax year)
2-4	1%
5-7	2%
8-10	3%
11 or more	4%

Self Assessment Tax Return
If you are required by HMRC to complete a self assessment tax return they will inform you by letter, usually in April.





Return can either be completed on paper or online. The deadline for paper is 31 October and has now passed for the 2010-11 tax year. The deadline for online is 31 January, 7 weeks from today.

If the deadline is missed the following penalties apply:

Length of delay	Penalty you will have to pay
1 day late	A fixed penalty of £100. This applies even if you have no tax to pay or have paid the tax you owe.
3 months late	£10 for each following day - up to a 90 day maximum of £900. This is as well as the fixed penalty above.
6 months late	£300 or 5% of the tax due, whichever is the higher. This is as well as the penalties above.
12 months late	£300 or 5% of the tax due, whichever is the higher. In serious cases you may be asked to pay up to 100% of the tax due instead. These are as well as the penalties above.

Doing Your Own Books

When you start a business the main focus is on promoting that business as without sales there is no business. However, maintaining your finances or doing your own books is an essential part of being self employed and ignoring them will lead to complications later.

This task can seem quite daunting if you don't know where to start but if you maintain your income and expenditure records from day one you shouldn't run into any problems. You don't need a sophiscated accounting package to maintain your records, a manual process will do but at the least a spreadsheet will make record keeping easier.

If you intent to use an accountant or a bookkeeper it is probably best to check with them what system they prefer, some of them may even offer a free spreadsheet to help you start.

If you stay on top of paperwork and not let it slip to weeks or months the job will not seem to big.

Make sure you claim for all costs incurred 'wholly and exclusively for business use', don't forget to include all the business mileage you do as well. If you use your home as your office you can claim a proportion of your utilities and even a proportion of your rent or mortgage interest.

If you're in any doubt about what you can claim speak to your accountant.

Once you have calculated how much profit you have made (income less costs) you then need to budget for tax and national insurance costs. If you save 25-30% of your profit as you go you will easily be able to afford your tax and national insurance bill. Open a separate saving account and put the money in there each month.

If you're still not sure about maintaining your finances speak to a bookkeeper.

Services

I can provide a variety of services for individuals and small or medium sized enterprises.

These range from:

Bookkeeping - recording the day to day transactions of a business

Payroll - as much or as little as required from producing payslips and paying employees to calculating and sending payments to HMRC and completing year end returns

VAT - quarterly returns and payments

Tax - from self assessment tax returns to corporation tax returns and payments

Companies House returns - compilation and filing

If you are interested in any of these services and would like to discuss requirements and costs please get in contact

Self Assessment Tax Return

The deadline for filing self assessment tax returns on paper has now passed, if you submit one you will be fined £100.

However, you can register on the HMRC website here: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/online/new.htm to submit your return online before midnight 31 January 2012.

If you have a bookkeeper or accountant they can submit the return online for you, but you have to register first.

If you need any further help contact your agent.

What is Bookkeeping?

Bookkeeping is the recording of financial transactions by an individual or organization.

The financial transactions include purchases and sales, receipts and payments.

A bookkeeper is responsible for ensuring the day to day transactions are recorded properly.

A bookkeeper should not be confused with an accountant.

An accountant is a provider of accounting: the measurement, disclosure and provision of financial information that enables decisions to be made about allocation of resources. An accountant can provide advice, a bookkeeper cannot.

By employing a bookkeeper you can save time on doing this task yourself and save money as the information provided to your accountant will already be in order, taking them less time to go through.

Introduction

My name is Samantha Nelmes and I started LilyIris Bookkeeping the summer of 2011.

I have over 15 years experience in the finance industry and am now putting all my knowledge to good use establishing my own business. 
I offer bookkeeping, payroll, VAT and tax services to individuals and small to medium sized business across the Bristol area.

This blog is designed to inform people of HMRC deadlines and regulation changes and any other useful information.