Hull accountancy news

Have you heard about the research & development tax credit? Or, if you have, did you think it won’t apply to you? For people in the first group it’s a government initiative to encourage investment in innovation and so to grow the economy (it’s been around for...

  My website guy, Steve, asked recently about frequently asked questions (FAQ); things prospective clients want to know. That got me thinking: What about the questions that people don't ask, but should; the frequently unasked questions so to speak (unfortunately...

Hello everyone, the madness of January tax return silly season is over and I can relax a bit. I still have lots of things to do that had to be put off and one of them is doing some planning for the new year. Now, whilst January is very hectic at least it is in the...

If you would like to save a lot of tax on your profits there are several ways to do it. You could simply not pay HMRC anything and then go and live in Paraguay. This is called tax evasion and is of course illegal. So don’t do it (anyway Paraguay is a probably a dump:...

Happy New Year Everyone Obviously I haven't made any new year resolutions as I find they get lost in the January rush to finish tax returns. Anyway, if something is worth doing you should start when you think about it not wait for an arbitrary date. I do have some...

  Do you think that Accountants are just for year end accounts or January tax returns? A purchase made grudgingly because you have to? Well think again. We can do so much more, throughout the year. I know the last thing you want is more accounts, more numbers to...

You may well have seen the Direct Line landlord insurance advert, you know; the one with the mafia-ish guy, "Prize plum...goes well with magnolia". Well the bigger problem for this guy is when he comes to move house. The apparently inoffensive comment "it's just my...

  Just checked my mobile phone, no missed calls or texts or emails. Loads of whatsapp notifications but I can ignore them all if I wish (and I generally do; I like to keep up but I can ask people how their holiday / concert / night out went when I see them) Same...

I’m sure that I have covered this before but it bears repeating. How would you like a pay cut? No, of course not, I hear you say. But wait; there are people who are being given pay cuts and are actually pleased about it!! I came across one last week. He had a fuel...

How long are you at work? 8 hours per day, with 5 weeks holidays gives 1,824 hours, that’s 114 days (allowing for the time you are asleep) or nearly a third of the year. A long time in other words. And that’s without overtime or the long hours that some people are...

Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration; so said Thomas Edison and he ought to know having filed patents for over 1,000 new products; items including the phonograph (early record player) and the dictaphone. But not the electric light bulb. Although it is...

I have been asked about rental properties this week and how to avoid the restrictions on interest deductions. In other words the problem that interest on buy to let (BTL) mortgages is only allowed at 20% against taxable income. That means if you are a higher rate tax...

I'm sure you will have heard of the Pareto Principle by now (also called the 80:20 rule) but if you haven't: Put simply most of your outputs come from a small amount of inputs. It isn’t always 80/20, it could be 70/30 or 99/1. It doesn’t have to add to 100, it might...

I've just been connecting up my TV. Not a big job nowadays, you just plug in, stick an HDMI lead in the back to the DVD player and switch it on. But which HDMI lead to get? Amazon will sell you one for a fiver or less. But I found a site with "entry level" leads at...

No I haven't gone mad. Well probably not. The 24th March used to be the last day of the legal year, with the new one starting on Lady Day (25th March). In 1751 however this was changed so that the legal year ended on 31st December. However the financial institutions...

Has anyone seen the new Facebook adverts? Facebook has decided to remove business posts from people’s newsfeeds “in order to improve the customer experience” which it will but it will also force businesses to pay for advertising as they have to with other platforms...

It's snowing ( a bit here, but melting so everything is slushy and wet... and cold) so I thought the picture above might cheer you all up a bit. Or not, you may be thinking, "that's out of my reach, why taunt me with it?". Well actually it's not out of your reach at...

Che bello If you’ve seen the iconic film “The Italian Job” (original not remake) you will remember the classic opening sequence where an orange Lamborghini Miura is driven along a twisty alpine road with Matt Monro's silky tones singing “On days like these”. Perfect...

I love February, yes it's cold and dull for the most part and often snowy but it has one main redeeming feature... It's not January. The tax return season has ended and I get at least 2 months of (relative) peace before April. So my New Year starts here. Office spring...

  It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas as Perry Como memorably sang. But don’t let up on the work. It’s immensely satisfying, I think, to take off the holiday knowing that you have put in a good month’s work and not “goofed off” because it’s the festive...

Everyone knows that accountants count things. But counting things isn't always as helpful as it might be. if you count the wrong things and/or in the wrong way it's pointless. The skill is to know what to count, how to count it, and when to count it. Most financial...

It has been a while since I have mentioned R&D tax credits. Or to put it another way, money lying around your business that you are ignoring. Simply put, the government wants innovation because it drives the economy and boosts taxes. So it helps out by giving...

The now famous introduction to Star Trek, "to boldly go etc.." and also beloved of grammar nerds who frequently tell you that it should be "to go boldly" (wrong, there is no such rule in English; it was made up by someone in the 18th century who wanted to make English...

  I suppose you will have seen the "X habits of successful people or Y things that successful people do/don't do" lists around the web or emailed in to you? One thing they always miss that ALL successful people do is this one: They breathe. In AND out....

As I write this it has started raining. Which it hasn’t done much of before this week. (You may beg to differ but I haven’t got wet walking the dog very often which is my reference point). And this got me thinking: Americans seem to think it rains all the time over...

Just finished Bill Bryson’s new book “In search of Little Dribbling” which is an update on his Notes from a Small Island. In it he travels around Britain looking at its unique character and observing the way things have changed since he arrived here in the 1970s. One...

    I read a very interesting book recently (Risk Savvy by Gerd Gigerenzer) which had a few things to say about risk and uncertainty. His team looked at various predictions made by analysts in the financial markets and found no correspondence at all between...

Never hoover in a forest Jim, nature abhors a vacuum. So does my dog but that's another story (and one that will be familiar to most dog owners). But the thing about Mr.Spock was that he tried to be logical at all times even though his human side kept bubbling up...

Learn to speak Klingon in only 3 months Each to their own I say and the advert I came across illustrates it perfectly. I have a friend who loves Sci-Fi, Manga, Anime and Comic books but he draws the line at re-enacting Star Trek by dressing up as characters or aliens...

Fortunately, keeping up a blog a week wasn't a resolution for 2021 as I missed last week's. In fact, as you may have gathered from the post of 6th January I haven't actually made ANY resolutions for this year, or set any goals or made any grand plans. Yes there are...

  So all the cards sent, all the presents bought and most of the food and drink in as well. I even had two small carolers come round last night. Haven't had any of those for years. It is beginning to look like Christmas. But have you thought what your business...

Yes it's Hallowe'en again And there are few things scarier than a huge tax bill. But fear not, we have the financial equivalent of garlic and crosses. Research & Development Tax Credits and the Patent Box. I know I mentioned this last week but it's important. You...

Winter isn't coming here at all. Although a Class 5 hurricane might be. Swings and roundabouts. The leaves are starting to turn, the nights are getting darker and we are gently moving towards Winter. On the one hand it will be cold and gloomy. On the other hand, a...

I was going to write about procrastination but then I thought I would do it next week. In the meantime, I have been organising my inbox, sorting and deleting old emails, unsubscribing myself to newsletters I never read and signing up to Throttle (which generates...

Henry the Taxman wants your money. Yes, for those of you who thought last week's post about flat rate VAT was boring, we had the budget this week.  And you will no doubt seen a lot of commentary about his tax grabs on self employed and small businesses so I won't add...

I have had a cold this week, my head feels like mush and it's hard to think, so not much work has been done apart from setting up my new computer (which was a mistake, the keyboard on my current computer stopped working as if in protest). Fortunately, after ringing...

A few years back a group of US students were asked to think about the last 2 digits of their social security numbers and decide if they would pay that in dollars for any of a set of items in an auction. When the testers had the actual auction the students with higher...

  Firstly, a very Happy New Year to you all. Let’s hope that 2020 proves to be a successful and prosperous one. I promised you in December that I would write a series of posts about pricing. Mainly because it is the one area where most people get it wrong (me...

  It’s not always good to be SMART You will have heard of SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time limited) although there are other more comprehensive definitions (significant and stretching for the S for instance) But although setting...

    Got anything planned for the bank holiday weekend? Maybe you are going away for the full week, which is what we used to do when I was a child. I assume it took our minds off the impending return to school, but also the weather changes around this time so it...

As you can see we are now at the advanced development stage. When I was little I wanted to be an inventor. I know, most kids want to be firemen or cowboys or astronauts but I didn’t (well, astronaut appealed until I found out how hard the training had been). I loved...

  Joanna Lumley as the actual first female Dr Who Remember when they turned Dr. Who into a woman, and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Personally I didn’t watch it so I didn’t really care. Whatever else it was hailed as an innovative idea. Except...

Hasn't it been a lovely couple of weeks of weather. Warm and dry. Sunny. Hopefully, this will be a good Summer. It's tempting to use this as an excuse to laze around and do as little as possible (but wait, whilst everyone else does that you can steal a march by...

    I was reading an old (2009) post from the investor magazine written by Tim Christoffel (Psy-Fi blog) and I thought you might like this. Remember it was written for stock market investors but the psychological quirks he highlights apply to everyone both...

Do you sometimes hear this: “Second place was invented to keep losers happy”.  Generally from fat Americans who would have a hard time coming first in anything other than a “who ate all the pies” competition. By that reckoning here are some “losers”. Goals for...

A couple of weeks ago I warned about the "private fuel trap" where you could be out of pocket if you have your company pay for your private mileage. There is a similar potential problem with company cars in general and this could affect you whether you are getting one...