This is our 24th newsletter! We have been writing newsletters for two years; they have been an amazing tool to stay in touch with our clients and make sure they have the information they need to help their businesses and their lives.

If there are topics you would like us to cover, which are of specific interest to you, please get in touch and let us know 😉.

If your employer pays your travel costs or business entertainment costs, those payments might need to be reported as a benefit in your P11D. The reason I am mentioning it is because business owners often make the error of thinking that all expenses as a director for lunches or petrol are business expenses.

Only expenses incurred in the production of income can be deducted as a business expense and so it is important to keep the proof of expense if HMRC ever asks for it.

This week I was at a workshop hosted by Tony from Action Coach and I was surprised at how important I thought his initial message was. He started off by saying ‘What will be your story in 2021’?

He was talking about your 2021 financial story and how to budget for 2021, but it made me think about what a difficult and trying year this has been and how we can plan for 2021.

Over the last 2 years we have attended Accountex, Xerocon and many other accounting conferences, and we really feel that the industry has changed too much.

I feel sometimes like I am getting old 😊 because I cannot keep up with so many changes recently, but I don’t think I am alone.

We believe that the recent changes are a result of changes in market demands, regulatory changes, a different generational approach and changes in client demands. We also think that businesses are currently willing to make the investment necessary to keep up with changes in accounting.

On top of all that, we can add COVID-19 and the work-from-home generation that needs the accounting industry to be more mobile and flexible.

Here are the top 5 things we believe will change significantly going forward in the accounting industry.

Over the next couple of months, we will be looking at Capital Gains Tax, how it works and practical applications of the rules surrounding Capital Gains Tax.

The first thing to understand is that Capital Gains Tax (CGT) is calculated in the following way:

Money received – Money Paid = Profits x Rate
i.e. CGT is levied on the profits you make from disposing of the assets and not the sales price.

Getting ready for the end of the year madness

If you haven’t submitted your self-assessment yet, please think about finalising it 😊.

I promise it will not take that much time, and if we can file your return before the end of December, I can ensure that the tax owing can be claimed through PAYE tax if you are employed. It is also easier to arrange for a payment plan if you owe money to HMRC. Waiting till the last minute will only mean that mistakes or misunderstandings can happen and will be frustrating for everyone.

We hope everyone had a good summer holiday, even if it was spent locally. I feel like it is becoming a bit cooler which means my kids are already asking me about Halloween 😊. The first day the kids went back to school, my husband and I managed to have a cheeky ‘Eat out to Help out’ breakfast for his birthday. I planned my outfit for hours. It was really nice to do something normal!

Like many businesses, we have recently looked at how we can best ensure that our doors stay open and we have been doing some additional business continuity planning, given everything that has happened in the world recently.

We decided that spending some time with a business coach would give a us a fresh perspective and help us get back to basics of our enterprise. We wanted to look at our value proposition and what makes us get up in the morning and do what we do.

One interesting thing he asked us was, ‘do you have a cashflow?’ and I could not help but pause for a moment and think ‘well, do we?!’

This is Anlo’s July Newsletter. If you would like to receive our newsletter, which has lots of great tips and updates, please add your email to the list! Simply subscribe by filling out the form.

This is a question I had, and I am still considering purely because I would like to get a garden office! It will be so helpful to be able to leave work at work and walk in the house and not worry about anything.

So here are my findings 😊

As you’ll be aware from our blogs and newsletters, we have been offering Xero training through the ANLO Academy. We have pulled together three lessons from our wonderful Irelene, well, they are more like quick “how to” dealing with creating a contacts group, customising email templates within Xero and how to check that a customer has received and viewed an invoice that you emailed to them. This is all simple but useful stuff – Xero is really powerful but getting the basics correct from the beginning can make your accounting life sooooo much easier ☺

So, without further ado, let’s dive right in.

There are some really smart people out there writing some really, really smart applications to help you with your bookkeeping – we use some of them ourselves and we are always happy to recommend and assist our clients in doing the same.

The following list isn’t exhaustive, but many of these we have personal experience of, and we know where their strengths and weaknesses lie.

Capital Gains Tax on Residential Properties

Big change here! If you are a UK resident and sell a residential property in the UK, you will have to pay the capital gains tax within 30 days of disposal.

Before, if you sold a property, the capital gain was disclosed in your self-assessment under the Capital Gains section and the deadline was the 31st of January. If you used the residential property as your private residence and the full exemption applied, you did not need to include the capital gain in your tax return.

Click to read about more changes…

This is Anlo’s May Newsletter. If you would like to receive our newsletter, which has lots of great tips and updates, please add your email to the list! Simply subscribe by filling out the form.

The most important thing that can guide us is past events. Even though this is not an indicator of what the future may hold, we need to use tools we have gained from experience to help us bounce back quicker.

There are a few similarities between the 2008 recession and what is happening currently: the uncertainty in markets, including consumer markets, the dramatic fluctuations in stock exchanges, and the political reaction of ‘whatever it takes’ to survive and succeed makes economies unstable and worried. All around the world are indicators that we are in a recession.

It is true than many things are quite different, but this blog is about surviving and planning for the worst 😊

By: Employease

Anlo is sharing this article from Amanda Galashan and Julie Calleux from Employease as it is a subject of great interest to our clients. For more specific information or to discuss your requirements please call either Amanda or Julie on 03339398741, or email info@employease.co.uk.

Last updated 24 April

The information below is what I know and have researched as on the 24th of April. When you read this there might be new guidance or information out there. As the saying goes, ‘the only thing we are certain off is death and taxes’, we can add another from 2020 ‘CHANGE’ 😊.

Post updated: 25 March, 2020

Companies will be given a 3 months extension to file their accounts at Companies House

Usually companies are required to file their accounts with Companies House 9 months after their year-end and if they don’t, they will receive a late filing penalty.

Following the announcement on Friday about the support that the government will give employees and business affected by the COVID-19, I thought it will be a good idea to summarise the facts and see how I can help my clients through this difficult time.

The below guidelines are for people affected by the COVID-19 virus and/or need to self-isolate because of the guidelines set by the government.

Please let me know if you have any questions and I will try and see if I can get more information for you from either the ICAEW, ICAS or HMRC.

Using Xero is a very empowering experience. You can see and understand what is happening in your business quicker and make decisions on accurate information.

With all the economic uncertainty, Xero has decided not to roll out their normal price increase until June/July 2020 and in the same spirit, Anlo will not be increasing the cost of any retainer packages due for renewal before June this year. Hopefully this will all help a little.

Just to make things a bit better, Hubdocs is now included in your subscription free of charge.

You can offer your clients different ways to pay for services or goods. When you account for the VAT on the transaction it is called tax points and different ways of payments might have different tax points.

If you receive an advance payment or a deposit for a transaction and the payment goes towards the supply of the service/goods, the tax point is the earlier of the receipt of payment or invoice date.

This means that the business can’t move out or change the VAT treatment of a transaction by accepting or offering to pay deposits or pre-payments in advance.

If you are renting out a property or a room in your house, you might need to register for self-assessment and declare the net profits in your self-assessment tax return, assuming that you are not already doing so.

Clients always ask me for management accounts, and we try and provide these on a regular basis, but what I have noticed is that clients don’t just want to receive reports, they want to understand their reports. They want to know what is happening in their business and why and have someone to chat to while seeking guidance and support.

It is the coolest feeling in the world when you sit with a client and they go, ‘aha!’ and feel better after you have clarified things for them. Even if it isn’t a nice thing to find out like the business isn’t profitable or that cashflow is horrific.

For the 5th of April 2020 tax year, there are a few tax-efficient ways to pay yourself (director or shareholder) through your limited company that we can use and consider that can assist in your self-assessment return.

Here is some information for self-assessment returns for directors of limited companies.

We have people asking us this question so often and the quick and simple answer is only through legal avenues (because the alternative isn’t worth it) and keeping proper accounting records. The reality is all business struggle with paying their VAT bill and it hits hard on business cash flow. 

The first thing to do, is accept that you are VAT registered and make sure you maintain proper accounting records to substantiate your VAT inputs and also your outputs. If your turnover is over £85,000 in a 12 month period, or you expect it to go over £85,000 in the next 30 days, you have no choice but to be registered, so make sure that you can claim the best possible inputs to reduce cash outflows or consider the different VAT schemes that will best suit your business.

As we have written before, the role of accountants is changing, and changing rapidly.  Although not gone forever, the idea of the accountant as a grey-haired man who reviews your figures once a year and delivers a stentorious judgement on them and your business is fast fading. 

These days you are much more likely to encounter fast-moving, technology-driven young accountants who are in a position to offer advice when required, enabling you to make better informed, more rapid business decisions.

At Xerocon this year the importance of cashflow management was heavily focussed on as something accountants and bookkeepers should help their clients get to grips with. 

There are so many amazing tools out there that can help manage and keep on top of cashflow, but regardless of how you do it, here are some cashflow tips:

There are some really smart people out there writing some really, really smart applications to help you with your bookkeeping – we use some of them ourselves and we are always happy to recommend and assist our clients in doing the same.

The following list isn’t exhaustive, but many of these we have personal experience of, and we know where their strengths and weaknesses lie.

Self-assessment tax submissions are well on their way for the 2018/2019 tax year and we thought we might help by giving these useful tips!

The highlight of day two at Xerocon was Major Tim Peake’s talk about his experience on the International Space Station. It was remarkable to listen to how he had to train and what he had to experience and go through to prepare himself for the job he had to do on the space station. It made me realise that if you want to achieve your ambitions, you need to prepare, train and work hard to get what you want. Nothing happens just because you’d like it to.

What a day!

We started the conference at 9am with an introduction from Steve Vamos, CEO of Xero Global and Gary Turner, CEO of Xero UK. They shared their stories and it really helped me to understand why Xero, as a company, does what they do.

The thing that I realised is that we all have a story to tell and these guys stories are not so different from yours or mine.

The ICAEW Practice Committee meeting was held in September in London and it was well attended with people coming from all over the United Kingdom. The attendees were members of all manner of practices and it was great to see everyone’s involvement and commitment towards the goal of improving standards within the profession.

Simple steps to help you and your company with cyber-attacks include:

Due to new EU regulations related to the banking industry, some bank feeds will stop working between August and September. This change is designed to improve information security and transparency. Basically, the feeds set up through a third party (e.g. Yodlee) will be stopped and a feed will need to be set up directly with a bank.