Inoff the Red

If you are planning on using a boat at sea I'd suggest doing a RYA day skipper theory course which would teach the basics of navigation, collision regs, weather, tides and all sorts of other useful stuff that will help you to avoid appearing on the RNLI web site as a rescue. If you have no experience of skippering a boat then I'd also suggest doing a practical boat handling course as well.

That's interesting, I wonder if others on here that are not on the flat rate scheme would benefit from switching. We routinely check to see whether clients would be better on a flat rate scheme but invariably find that they wouldn't be. One reason could be the nature of capital additions. Under the flat rate scheme Capex in excess of £2,000 (i.e. the invoice from a single supplier is for £2k+) can be treated outside the flat rate scheme and the vat reclaimed. If capital expenditure tends to relate to low value items or is purchased from multiple suppliers, then the vat is effectively lost. So if a business buys big pieces of kit the flat rate scheme may be worth doing. The forestry scheme rate of 10.5% may appear to be generous but in calculating the vat payable to HMRC it is applied to the VAT inclusive total of sales. So for total sales of £120,000 (£100,000 +£20,000 vat) the vat payable is £12,600 (being £120,000 x 10.5%) so it is an effective rate of 12.6%. whether this is low enough to result in a saving to a business will depend on its cost and overhead structure and capex profile.

Although the flat rate scheme may appear to be an attractive option, i have rarely found anyone that actually benefits from it. As a matter of interest what scheme rate are you on? As for the collection of vat receipts, you may not need them for your vat return but you certainly will need them for the purposes of doing your accounts/tax return. Regardless of whether you are self employed or operating through a limited company/partnership or LLP you are obliged to keep a record of all purchases and expenses and retain invoices and receipts. If you had an HMRC inspection and could not provide evidence to show that purchases/expenses were business related (as opposed to being personal expenses) you could have a major problem.

I was sailing down in your neck of the woods last week (Plymouth, Fowey, Mevagissey, Falmouth, Fowey, Plymouth). Didn't see any seals but did spot some huge barrel jellyfish that were as big as a dustbin!

Did you get the name and number of the policeman that tried to fob you off? The fact that this started off as a commercial transaction is irrelevant, the failure to return the item is theft and is therefore a criminal matter. Your remedies for the guy failing to pay etc are civil matters but for the police not to take action over the theft is criminal. The definition of theft is "the dishonest appropriation of property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it." I suggest contacting the police again and ask them to explain to you why, given the facts, they do not consider the matter to be theft because it appears to satisfy the definition. Advise them that if they do not change their view you will make a formal complaint. You should also write to your MP.

He'd challenge a lifetime ban as being a breach of his 'uman rights…..a more apt punishment would be to make him wear a muzzle whenever he is out in public.

PM sent

Having read the report of the court hearing, the reason the council got hit with the fine was because "neither the Outwood-based property firm ….nor tree surgeons ATC had been made aware of the order, and the council had not served the order correctly." This is all too typical of local authorities, they have the power to protect the environment but many of them are just incompetent. The person(s) responsible should be disciplined but they will doubtless continue in employment enjoying gold plated pension schemes.

Don't think that the VAT inspector would have ignored the problem if you had manual books rather than a computerised system. In the absence of the computer records, the inspector would identified one item that had been incorrectly treated and the given you his/her estimate of the likely total error. You would then be left with the problem of proving that the estimate was wrong. The benefit of computerised systems that is often overlooked is the management information it can provide at the touch of a button and the build up of customer sales info that could be valuable for marketing purposes or, when the time comes to hang up your chainsaw, give your business some value.

I agree that dumping a box of paper on the accountant will incur an avoidable cost. The point I was trying to make is that if a business owner doesn't want to do it themselves they need to be careful who does it and how its done. I have seen spreadsheets prepared that looked fantastic, but some of the formulae were wrong, some had been over written, where the totals didn't include all items in the column and, on one occasion, where the number of the month had been included.

In the same way that if folk shop around they could probably find an amateur with a chainsaw to take a tree down, they tend to charge less than an arborist. Sometimes buying on price can be a false economy.

Beeswax melts at about 62/64c (144f) An easy way to melt wax is to put the wax in a big jar and stand the jar in pan of boiling water, you can see the wax melt and then pour it into your moulds. If you leave it for a few mins before pouring any honey in the wax will separate and any bits fall to the bottom of the jar.

Computerisation of your accounting records should, if done properly, help you to take your business to another level. There have been a number of threads started recently and it appears that quite a few send a bag of paper to their accountant at the year end to do a set of accounts/tax return. I can understand why this happens but I think it is a mistake, especially if a business is growing. Actually, it is not difficult to use a computer package to keep tabs on your business so you know how you are doing month on month. These packages, if set up properly, can also provide a lot of useful management information. Clients that I have migrated onto a computer system now wonder how they managed without it, not only in terms of information available but also because it is an easier and more efficient way of processing the basics.

If it is a colony of bumble bees, unless they are causing a nuisance or can be moved easily I'd leave them where they are, they will be gone in autumn/winter. Unless the bumbles have nested in a box (they are often attracted to bird boxes) I think you will find it difficult to move them. Although bumbles are not aggressive, if you start destroying the nest while trying to move them they will get agitated. If you want to keep bumbles do a search on Amazon for bumble bee nests and you will get an idea of what to build to house them. If however, they are honey bees and not bumbles then I suggest you enlist the help of a beekeeper to move them because the consequences of getting it wrong could be quite dramatic. A bumble bee nest may comprise 30 or 40 bees, a honey bee swarm could have 20,000.

If you think those works of art are expensive, you should have seen some of the offerings at the Chelsea flower show. One exhibitor had made a horse out of what looked like bits of bark, sticks and the stuff you normally have lying around on a site after you have brought a tree down. Asking price £23,000

When you say you are paying a fortune in NI and tax, what exactly do you mean? Are you using a payroll package to calculate payslips or are you doing it manually? Don't forget that small businesses can now claim the employers allowance of up to £2,000 a year to reduce employers NIC contributions. Also when you say you are paying a fortune in tax do you mean on your profits or in respect of your part time employee? If you mean the latter, then really it is not costing you anything, you are paying it over to HMRC instead of your employee. Don't forget to make your monthly RTI returns on time because the Revenue will soon start issuing penalties for late filing.

:thumbup1:

Mine are in nationals but i am now using brood and a half or double brood boxes. My apiary backs onto a row of trees but faces south.

By commercial customer I presume you mean someone that will resell the logs rather than use them themselves.

No, THIS is company policy is formed……. In the beginning there was the Plan. And then came the Assumptions. And the Assumptions were without form. And the Plan was without substance. And darkness was on the face of the Workers. And they spoke among themselves, saying "It is a crock of ****, and it stinks". And the Workers went unto their Supervisors and said "It is a pail of dung, and none may abide the odor thereof". And the Supervisors went unto their Managers, saying "It is a container of excrement, and it is very strong, such that none can abide by it". And the Managers went unto their Directors saying "It is a vessel of fertilizer, and none may abide its strength". And the Directors spoke among themselves, saying one to another "It contains that which aids plant growth, and it is very strong". And the Directors went unto the Vice Presidents, saying unto them "It promotes growth, and it is very powerful". And the Vice Presidents went unto President saying unto him "This new Plan will actively promote the growth and vigor of this company, with powerful effects". And the President looked upon the Plan and saw it was good. And the Plan became Policy.

I suggest you have a look at these:- https://www.gov.uk/holiday-entitlement-rights/entitlement Acas - Advice leaflet - Holidays and holiday pay If you employ staff, their holiday entitlement should be set out in their contract of employment.

That is how HMRC will spin this…you have nothing to fear if you pay up. In reality it is a disaster waiting to happen. Unfortunately there are numerous examples of where HMRC have made huge mistakes and taken aggressive action on the basis of information that turned out to be incorrect. There is a truly frightening and widely reported case involving a business called Abbey Forwarding. Basically HMRC issued a demand for VAT on the grounds that the company was smuggling alcohol. The directors challenged this assessment but rather than enter a debate about it HMRC appointed a liquidator in an Ex-parte hearing that the directors knew nothing about. The appointment of a liquidator effectively prevented the directors from challenging HMRC's claim and the directors/shareholders of a profitable and long established business lost everything, including their good name. It subsequently transpired that HMRC were mistaken in their belief that the company was smuggling but in a manner that seems to be adopted by many public bodies these days (think NHS and Stafford, think Police and Hillsborough/Plebgate etc) instead of owning up to a mistake, they tried to blag it in court. The judge was damning in his criticism of HMRC and the liquidator but the directors /shareholder of Abbey still have to go to court for restitution. For those with a strong constitution do a Google search on Abbey Forwarding or check out the following links in order How one family were brought to their knees by the taxman - Telegraph MP claims Deloitte liquidator aided HMRC ?vendetta? | AccountingWEB Then there is the case of the construction company that was owed £250k in respect of CIS deductions that had been withheld from contract payments and paid over to HMRC. HMRC refused to pay the money back to the company because they had a query over £50. HMRC refused to make a payment on account because the error of £50 could mask bigger and more substantial errors and required a full reconciliation. In the absence of the repayment, the company defaulted on its VAT payment and was subsequently hit with £30k penalties for late payments. On a smaller level, I have seen examples of people being doorstepped by debt collectors demanding payment of tax that had actually been paid on time. Unfortunately HMRC had allocated the payment to the prior year. It should have been obvious to them that the amount they were chasing was the same amount as an apparent over payment in the previous year but their response when challenged on this was that they assumed the overpayment related to an under-declaration of tax in respect of the prior year and still maintained the tax was payable. If HMRC had had the power to dip into a taxpayers bank account for "arrears" then they would have taken the money. If HMRC believe they are owed money, they already have the tools to enforce payment without dipping into people's bank accounts when it suits them.

Tricky one. I like the idea of a common market, but I dislike the bureaucratic and undemocratic attempts to create a united states of Europe by stealth. That Euro MPs cannot introduce legislation tells you everything you need to know about the democratic intentions of the unelected Euro commissioners . On balance I am an "Out". The attempts at scaremongering about jobs and trade etc is a nonsense imho. The wealth of this country will be a significant lever when it comes to negotiating free trade agreements.

The benefit in kind calculation for a company car is based on the vehicle's carbon emissions and the manufacturers list price of the car when new. (Note, LIST PRICE WHEN NEW, not what the car actually cost). The value of the benefit in kind for cars with low emissions (1- 75gms/km) is 5% of the list price. For a car with high emissions (220 gms/km +) the annual benefit is 35% of the list price. So as an example, a company car with a list price of £40k with high emissions will land the driver with a benefit in kind of £14,000 (£40k x 35%). For a 40% tax payer, this will result in tax payable of £5,600. In addition, if the employer provides fuel for private use, there will be an additional benefit which will further increase tax payable. The fuel benefit is based on a fixed amount (£20,200 for 2012/13; £21,200 for 2013/14) and the benefit is calculated by applying the emissions percentage to this fixed sum. so continuing the example above, the fuel benefit would be £7,070 (£20,200 x 35%) resulting in tax payable of £2,828. The days when company cars used to be worth having disappeared long ago imho.

Munky… You can only claim VAT back if you are VAT registered and so if you are employed (as opposed to self employed) you cannot recover VAT paid on equipment purchased BUT……..read on…... If you have to provide your own saws and equipment for work and this requirement is recorded in your contract of employment, then, each year you can claim for the cost (including any VAT) of all of your equipment purchases, oils etc (and safety clothing helmet, boots, professional subscriptions etc). You can't ask for tax relief if your employer has reimbursed you for the expenses incurred but, if your employer pays an allowance which is taxed, then there is nothing to stop you from claiming tax relief on your equipment costs etc. Claiming for travelling costs is another area where many people miss out on claiming. You cannot claim the cost of travelling from home to your work base, but you can claim for the costs of travelling to site if you work away from your employment base. Employers can choose what rate to reimburse mileage expenses. Since 6 April 2011, for cars and vans HMRC will allow payment of 45p per mile for the first 10,000 miles and then 25p per mile thereafter. (Prior to 5 April 2011 the rates were 40p and 25p). If your employer currently pays you less than 45p per mile, you can claim the difference as an expense of your employment. Also, if you pay for your own mobile phone and you use it when at work, then imho there is an argument for claiming those costs also.