I know its a grey area at present, and probably a loop hole that HMRC will close soon in regards to IR35, but maybe may be of interest for someone
The scare of IR35 is enough for me not to go back to Self Employed, Only if I was working several contracts a month or I was able to substitute my services for another driver, working 40-50 hrs a week at set hours hours is to me a contravention to HMRC rules which means as such you are an employee not an employer and could be slammed with a nice big tax request
If I am wrong on my thinking of IR35, Please let me know, and maybe I would consider going back Self employed thru Ltd company
HGV CLASS 1 DRIVER
Vacancy from Jobcentre Plus
Job No:CAV/56447SOC
Code:8211
WageEXCEEDS NAT MIN WAGE
Hours40-50 PER WEEK, MONDAY-FRIDAY, 5:00AM - 5:00PM
LocationCASTLEFORD, WEST YORKSHIRE WF10
DurationPermanent
Date posted09 March 2012
Pension details No details held
Description This is a self employed vacancy. HGV Class 1 Driver required, 40-50 hours per week. Container experience preferred, but not essential. Must have own transport to commute to site 4-5 nights out per week. £8 per hour or 22.5% of truck earnings. Clean licence preferred. Rhides or park experience advantage but not essential.The company has given an assurance that this vacancy enables workers to achieve a wage equivalent to the National Minimum Wage rate. Self-employed people are responsible for paying their own National Insurance contributions and Tax. For information on how benefits are affected and whether entitlement may be lost, speak to a Jobcentre Plus Adviser.
How to apply
You can apply for this job by telephoning 07432 811736 ext 0 and asking for Mat Barker.
Employer
M and T Transport
PinkLadyTrucker:
I know its a grey area at present, and probably a loop hole that HMRC will close soon in regards to IR35, but maybe may be of interest for someone
The scare of IR35 is enough for me not to go back to Self Employed, Only if I was working several contracts a month or I was able to substitute my services for another driver, working 40-50 hrs a week at set hours hours is to me a contravention to HMRC rules which means as such you are an employee not an employer and could be slammed with a nice big tax request
If I am wrong on my thinking of IR35, Please let me know, and maybe I would consider going back Self employed thru Ltd company
Yes it is, this is an employed position, not open to self-employment.
Harry Monk:
Yes it is, this is an employed position, not open to self-employment.
That’s what I thought, but its advertised on the Job center site as Self Employment, So Either its a Job Center mess up or the employer is trying to make the Driver take a position which unless he complies to IR35 (which would be no benefit at the rates stated) or the driver ignores the IR35 implications and benefits from lower tax and NIC’s payments, but which could be a costly later when HMRC closes the grey areas
If you are doing the same work for the same people on a regular basis, here’s a couple of questions to ask when deciding if you can legally do this self employed.
Harry Monk:
Yes it is, this is an employed position, not open to self-employment.
That’s what I thought, but its advertised on the Job center site as Self Employment, So Either its a Job Center mess up or the employer is trying to make the Driver take a position which unless he complies to IR35 (which would be no benefit at the rates stated) or the driver ignores the IR35 implications and benefits from lower tax and NIC’s payments, but which could be a costly later when HMRC closes the grey areas
The Job Center, believe it or not, do not vet job adverts unless someone rings them to complain.
Makes me laugh that “Exceeds the Minimum Wage” can appear in an ad at all!
“Competetive Salary” tells us nothing either.
FFS. We’re all trying to get work that pays - nothing more, nothing less.
Why does the proverbial jokeshop plus ad tell us detail we could do without?
Hiding their own shame for pushing a job that pays less than a standard cost of living perhaps?
After two weeks of solid work, I’m now facing a third week without any.
If I were self-employed at this point, I’d now have no money coming in at all. I reckon that for me to chance going self-employed at some point in the future, I’d have to have multiple income streams that are already above the tax free threshold. There’s little reward it seems for “going it alone” nowdays.
22.5% of truck earnings, what IF you are transporting a trailer full of broken pallets?
22.5% of ZERO earnings equals a MInus payment? as the truck will still be costing to do the run in the first instance
Seriously, If its 22.5% of truck earnings, why say £8 ph ? Probably its only going to pay around £6:50 ph in reality and you will not benefit from being self employed anyways ■■
If you don’t work at all, you don’t make any money.
Worse however is getting paid so low as SE/OD that you LOSE money which HMRC then doesn’t give a ■■■■ about when it comes to offsetting future earnings UNLESS they occur in the same tax year.
On the form is says “If your business made a loss this year, put the earnings figure as zero.”
You can’t offset zero.
Since the plum work isn’t available every week, it seems better to work half the time for better money paying less tax and getting the tax credits bumped up to make up for the non-earning weeks. The only problem is as I’ve pointed out in the previous post - when you reach week three with no work!
Fortunately, that problem is done for the week having picked up 32 hours minimum this morning.
Sorry I am rubbish on a computer, copy the above into your browser and take the ir35 test to see if you would be at risk.
I have been self employeed class one driver mainly working on one contract for a long time now, and looked into the IR35 question in quite a bit of detail. Yes its a very grey area but if your circumstances are similar to mine I would say you and most other drivers are at very low risk of being in any sort of IR35 trouble. As far as IR35 goes for myself there is one big fact that counts in our favour with agency work, and that is there is NO CONTRACT!
1, I could be out of the door with no notice at all, and not required to supply my services any longer. Likewise i would not give any notice and i could just simply not work for them again without breaking any contract arrangements, because there are none.
There are other elements which come into it but the above is the main one. My start times are sometimes changed, ie I dont do 9-5 every day. I have paid for training (CPC) and equipment (SAT NAV, BOOTS/SAFETY CLOTHING ETC) for myself the company im contracting for has not. I am working for the company on a (as required) basis because in times of little work or shutdown I have been told that my services are not required. I am free to contract myself out to other companies.
The list goes on, I have done the above test and come out as very low risk so there you go.
Forgot to say, my accountant told me last year he started doing tax returns for ltd company drivers over 6 years ago at around 100 drivers per year. Out of all those ltd companies 1, yes one, has had the ir35 problem. After looking into the driver they didn’t bother taking it any further.
Ir35 was supposed to raise 300 million in taxes it has only raised 6!
Winseer:
If you don’t work at all, you don’t make any money.
Worse however is getting paid so low as SE/OD that you LOSE money which HMRC then doesn’t give a ■■■■ about when it comes to offsetting future earnings UNLESS they occur in the same tax year.
On the form is says “If your business made a loss this year, put the earnings figure as zero.”
You can’t offset zero.
What form are you blithering on about? Trading losses can be offset against previous or future profits.
I made a trading loss of £22k last year, and not one penny of it is offset against any earnings I make except capital gains tax which does not apply, since I’ve never been in the position to pay it. I wanted it put against just about any other tax apart from the one I don’t ever pay, but no.
THIS year I am faring better on being able to offset non-working weeks against the full time ones, so not only do I pay very little tax, I get a rebate of nearly all of it, and qualify for other goodies as well like tax credits.
Since the top end of the market (CGT & Expenses) doesn’t work well for me, I’ll limbo for the bottom end (tax credits & income tax rebates) instead.
All I got as SE last year was no benefits, a lot of stress, and ultimately not only no cash & income, but a loss that was not offsettable on top. That’s it for me with SE until the game changes considerably to favour those in the market rather than manipulating it.
I lost it europewide in dribs drabs & haircuts, thanks to the far east mainly overbidding me on my contract, leaving me high and dry and forced to deliver consignments for the rate whilst the cost of actually picking up and paying for the goods is raised out of my profit range. It’s not hard to make money in this business - but it’s even easier to lose it if you have entire bodies of people operating against you after you’ve already committed…
No I didn’t own my own truck - I was merely organising round trips sending out foodstuffs and foolishly (as it turned out) electing to pay my end in euros only to see the euro price ramped up after I’ve accepted sterling or dollars up front for my end.
Remember the european butter mountain of a few years ago? There were a few who snapped up some cheap stock only to find that a change in legislation meant that they could not shift it ANYWHERE in the EU! - These suits will move the goalposts to make them money, at the expense of those actually handling the damned stuff! Back then it was the Europeans like Brussels doing the manipulating. Nowdays its either India or China for foodstuffs with the arab states still fooling around with liquid fuel whilst Russia manipulates the price of Gas & non-ferrous metals.
I would have lost a lot more, but the losses were mitigated partly by some success stories with regards to south american exports. I don’t trade in the business anymore now, as the bond seems forever rising whilst a non-level playing field leaves those on the ground floor at a disadvantage, unlike South America where it seems to be played straight still. I’d emigrate there (Northern Chile perhaps) if I could afford the upheaval, which I can’t with my unpaid-off mortgage and everything, despite that being my only debt these days.
I don’t believe it is possible to become a successful (ie wealthy) owner driver in this unlevel environment anymore, and nowdays I’m quite happy to just do the driving, and let someone else take the financial risks in future.
Meanwhile, just imagine transporting copper ore on these Atacama roads A-B no bull, no kids throwing stuff off non-existant bridges etc etc.
Winseer:
:x I made a trading loss of £22k last year, and not one penny of it is offset against any earnings I make except capital gains tax which does not apply, since I’ve never been in the position to pay it. I wanted it put against just about any other tax apart from the one I don’t ever pay, but no.
THIS year I am faring better on being able to offset non-working weeks against the full time ones, so not only do I pay very little tax, I get a rebate of nearly all of it, and qualify for other goodies as well like tax credits.
Since the top end of the market (CGT & Expenses) doesn’t work well for me, I’ll limbo for the bottom end (tax credits & income tax rebates) instead.
All I got as SE last year was no benefits, a lot of stress, and ultimately not only no cash & income, but a loss that was not offsettable on top. That’s it for me with SE until the game changes considerably to favour those in the market rather than manipulating it.
Pretty much most of what you are saying makes no sense (to me at least). If you made a trading loss last year of 22k that would pretty much give you tax credits, as someone else pointed out its also offsetable against the next years earnings.
I’ve never heard if being able to ‘offset non working weeks against full time ones’ either . The 'top end of the market (CGT & Expenses) 'is not designed to work for anyone except for the government, i.e if you make a capital gain then you pay tax on it, its generally seperate to any form of general income tax. Although i see you’re limboing at the bottom end of the market getting tax rebates, where are the rebates coming from?
Tax credits are a benefit that I get from more of a combination of being a dad to a school-aged child and a non-working wife who doesn’t claim anything for herself. I don’t consider the impact of last year’s losses as being an important part of me getting tax credits, but as you say, they do take last year’s income into account - but only to zero - NOT below zero. This is on the tax credit declaration form. Capital losses are offset against capital gains only however, which as I no longer run the business I ran last spring it no longer applies. I’ve tried to make the best of my position a year on from what amounts to a disaster for my first full year outside of full time employment, but I’ve not done too bad in the year after April 2011 considering. I’m not really increasing any tax credits or income tax rebates I get from last year’s losses - it’s THIS year’s lack of earnings (albeit deliberate!) that have the most effect on it, alongside me having a young family and being the only breadwinner. Change any of the latter circumstances, and I’d soon find out how little HMRC care about “last year’s losses compared to this year’s” in short order I’m sure!
With little well-paid full time trunking work left, I’d rather work 100ish hours a month via agencies for £1300 takehome than 200ish hours a month for £1700 takehome based on the FT jobs I’m seeing advertised at around £500 a week IF you can get them.
As far as I can work out, as soon as I go past £18kpa, I stand to pretty much lose all but the rump £10 of the tax credits I now get. The £1300 figure means I’m effectively netting £13 an hour, but I don’t get paid that by the agency - it’s made up with the tax credits on top which have the nice aspect of not counting towards your taxable income in their own right (unlike jobseekers allowance, and other benefits which DO!)
One week on, one week off would do me just fine. At present though it’s slow-slow-quick-quick-slow which means there’s a lot of room for improvement!
Winseer, I know you say you are not still runing “the business” as you were. However, when you were, were you by any chance completing your own self assessment form rather than paying an accountant to do it?
