Pub gig fees

[Nicko]

3 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

That's intended for business expenses. Not personal expenses. If you're continually trying to offset your PAYE against your 'hobby' expenses that's not right. 

It is actually a requirement to declare hobby incomes if they exceed £1000 in a year to HMRC.

[Count Bassy]

4 minutes ago, TimR said:

 

That's intended for business expenses. Not personal expenses. If you're continually trying to offset your PAYE against your 'hobby' expenses that's not right. 

 If you declare incidental earnings to the HMRC then you are entitled to claim expenses against those earnings. But, I don't think you can claim losses in one area of income against profit in another area of income. However IIRC, you can claim losses from one year against profits from another year.

 

In a lot of cases of ametuer/semi pro musicians the difference between earnings and expenses is small and people don't worry about declaring the difference. For small turnover businesses you simply need a three line declaration - Income, expediture, and profit/loss.

[pete.young]

3 hours ago, Happy Jack said:

 

We went into our NYE gig being well aware that it's the sort of pub where people pay almost entirely by card. The pub was always going to make a mint that night, but there was real doubt that they'd have the cash to pay us.

 

Solution?

 

https://sumup.co.uk/air-contactless-card-reader-gsuk/?gclid=CjwKCAiA24SPBhB0EiwAjBgkhq95mN_UOrEEEaF5xxpsYd3DZwokgBqHMXy-iLsWwvqmfPFgJ4uI2BoCzzYQAvD_BwE

 

For a one-off payment of £35 I can now accept payments by card for any band I play in. The only on-going charge is their 2% transaction fee. For £300 gigs we now charge £306 if the venue wishes to pay by card. 

 

It's against the law to charge a fee for a card or a different method of payment.

[Happy Jack]

You'll never take me alive, copper!

[lownote]

1 hour ago, Nicko said:

It is actually a requirement to declare hobby incomes if they exceed £1000 in a year to HMRC.

Yeah, my accountant got twichy at the number of basses I was buying and selling on BC, thought it was a business.  When I pointed out I usually lost a little on every deal he said that didn't matter. Anyway, when I worked I was a media trainer and once had the pleasure of ripping the then deputy Head of HMRC to shreds, including telling her the HMRC wasn't fit for purpose.  Her response was luke warm...   I spect she has my number.

[EBS_freak]

What was your argument saying that HMRC isn’t fit for purpose?

[EBS_freak]

2 hours ago, BigRedX said:

 

I think EBS_Freak was referring to the fact that you'd called HMRC "Inland Revenue"...

Bingo!

 

At least get the name right and all that.

[Huge Hands]

8 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

Bingo!

 

At least get the name right and all that.

Apologies.  My poor defence is naivety - I have been on standard full time PAYE contracts for years (I bet that is out of date too).    I think the most I earned from gigging in any one year was about £300....

 

Last time I dealt with HMRC was before 2005.....

[EBS_freak]

3 hours ago, Grimalkin said:

 

You just need a specialised accountant, who understands the requirements of your employment. From strings to stage clothes.

Even with the most specialised accountant, I think you’ll still have trouble making any payments to the Inland Revenue

[Bassfinger]

4 hours ago, Nicko said:

It is actually a requirement to declare hobby incomes if they exceed £1000 in a year to HMRC.

Another good reason to either...

 

A) Insist upon cash. Not always possible, but still the bulk go thst way.

 

B) Don't boast about it on Faecesbook, and definitely not with your full name

 

C) Make sure there are enough band members to divide the cash up so you never reach a grand.  Wives and girfriends can take an equal cut by for doing publicity, organising, restringing instruments, anything vaguely legitimate and necessary, and thus my £1000 suddenly becomes £500 yet still remains under my roof. Ditto my band chums and their other halves.

 

So many ways and means, you're just fine if you're cautious and clever.

[TimR]

I think the £1k turnover is a response to the pandemic isn't it? I've never heard of it before. It's to encourage people into business and reduce the amount of paperwork.

 

If you're doing pub gigs at £50 a gig and doing 2 a month then you're nowhere near it. It's only really going to make a difference if you're playing lots of function gigs and at that point you're going to need to keep tabs on the Financial side of things. 

 

If you are claiming tax for car use, you have to do it one of two ways, you can't do half of one and half of another. ie you can't claim the car as a capital expenditure and also claim per mile. 

 

If you own the music equipment personally then you don't have to include it in turnover, if its part of the business then you then have to include any profits and losses from sales. I suspect deciding which of the basses you personally own or not would get complicated. 

 

It sounds to me like an awful lot of work to try and claim a few quid if you're not Self Assessed already. 

[Downunderwonder]

8 hours ago, iconic said:

Anyway back on topic, just a heads up.

I see mention of different charges for different payment methods, this a breach of consumer law, has been for a while now

Not over here. It was a breach of the merchant account conditions with the bank, until the gummint said those contracts were illegal. Now very common to see surcharge percentages added onto credit card transactions. People are addicted to credit so the banks just make their end on a bigger amount.

[iconic]

20 minutes ago, Downunderwonder said:

Not over here. It was a breach of the merchant account conditions with the bank, until the gummint said those contracts were illegal. Now very common to see surcharge percentages added onto credit card transactions. People are addicted to credit so the banks just make their end on a bigger amount.

Interesting.😎

 

I have my own business and, no longer take any card payments due to the change, those 2.5%s really add up for big ticket items. 

 

I'm not alone in this. 

Edited January 14, 2022 by iconic

[Downunderwonder]

12 minutes ago, iconic said:

Interesting.😎

 

I have my own business and, no longer take any card payments due to the change, those 2.5%s really add up for big ticket items. 

 

I'm not alone in this. 

Aussie have told the credit card banks to shove it and limited the fees they can charge to less than 1%. I don't know why it's taking so long to get done here. 2.5% off of 'everything' is out and out robbery, they're  'taxing' all your costs of sale, plus the VAT!

[Lozz196]

In my last band we had to do it legit, mainly due to the amount of merch we sold. We never took anything out, preferring to reinvest it all in the company, which in turn enabled us to take up opportunities that had we taken £50 or so at the end of the night wouldn’t have been available to us, such as a 4 night stopover when we played in Athens. Which was nice.

[TimR]

Amazon are stopping Visa in next few days. They did a deal with Mastercard.

 

So there must be something about not charging. 

 

But a friend of mine tried to buy a car and there was going to be a surcharge for that. 

[iconic]

3 minutes ago, TimR said:

Amazon are stopping Visa in next few days. They did a deal with Mastercard.

 

So there must be something about not charging. 

 

But a friend of mine tried to buy a car and there was going to be a surcharge for that. 

Car sale? Not right, can't do it, price must be same for cash, card or transfer. That's my business. 

 

Some are charging an admin fee, hmm, that's pushing it, not been a test case of note yet😎

[TimR]

3% on a £20k motor is a lot to swallow.

 

Guess that's why Amazon have just said no. 

[pete.young]

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/718812/payment-surcharges-guidance-update.pdf

 

[Happy Jack]

7 hours ago, EBS_freak said:

Even with the most specialised accountant, I think you’ll still have trouble making any payments to the Inland Revenue

 

I'm old enough to remember the scandal about Mr. Inlandi Revenoo ...

 

[Nicko]

On 14/01/2022 at 18:20, TimR said:

I think the £1k turnover is a response to the pandemic isn't it? I've never heard of it before. It's to encourage people into business and reduce the amount of paperwork.

 

If you're doing pub gigs at £50 a gig and doing 2 a month then you're nowhere near it. It's only really going to make a difference if you're playing lots of function gigs and at that point you're going to need to keep tabs on the Financial side of things. 

 

If you are claiming tax for car use, you have to do it one of two ways, you can't do half of one and half of another. ie you can't claim the car as a capital expenditure and also claim per mile. 

 

If you own the music equipment personally then you don't have to include it in turnover, if its part of the business then you then have to include any profits and losses from sales. I suspect deciding which of the basses you personally own or not would get complicated. 

 

It sounds to me like an awful lot of work to try and claim a few quid if you're not Self Assessed already. 

I'm not sure of your maths here.  2 x £50 = £100 per month x 12 months = £1200. 

 

You could only claim the capital cost of the vehicle if you only use it for band work. 

 

If you own the equipment you cannot retrospectively claim it's cost, but if for example you bought a spare bass or a new cab you could.

[Nicko]

On 14/01/2022 at 18:01, Bassfinger said:

Another good reason to either...

 

A) Insist upon cash. Not always possible, but still the bulk go thst way.

 

B) Don't boast about it on Faecesbook, and definitely not with your full name

 

C) Make sure there are enough band members to divide the cash up so you never reach a grand.  Wives and girfriends can take an equal cut by for doing publicity, organising, restringing instruments, anything vaguely legitimate and necessary, and thus my £1000 suddenly becomes £500 yet still remains under my roof. Ditto my band chums and their other halves.

 

So many ways and means, you're just fine if you're cautious and clever.

If you did this with any other income you would be considered to be evading tax.  

[EBS_freak]

D) channel all your money into offshore tax havens whilst you’re at it.

[Doddy]

On 14/01/2022 at 18:01, Bassfinger said:

Another good reason to either...

 

A) Insist upon cash. Not always possible, but still the bulk go thst way.

 

B) Don't boast about it on Faecesbook, and definitely not with your full name

 

C) Make sure there are enough band members to divide the cash up so you never reach a grand.  Wives and girfriends can take an equal cut by for doing publicity, organising, restringing instruments, anything vaguely legitimate and necessary, and thus my £1000 suddenly becomes £500 yet still remains under my roof. Ditto my band chums and their other halves.

 

So many ways and means, you're just fine if you're cautious and clever.

And then you wonder why musicians get bad reputations.

[gareth]

1 hour ago, EBS_freak said:

D) channel all your money into offshore tax havens whilst you’re at it.

Always remembering that if you remain U.K. tax resident you are taxed on your world wide income and gains including any on  “your money into offshore tax havens”