It was Jeremy Hunt’s turn in the spotlight on Tuesday 22 November 2023. As Chancellor he was making an autumn statement about upcoming changes, including to some taxes. The most significant change is to national insurance contributions, which are a kind of tax for working people.
READ MORE > Posted on 24 November 2023
Anyone who’s been on one of my courses will know that I have collected together a dozen ‘help sheets’ on different topics that are useful for freelancers.
READ MORE > Posted on 03 November 2023
There are two stages to paying income tax when you’re a sole trader: In between these you will receive a tax bill from HMRC. You can submit your self-assessment tax return as soon as a tax year finishes on 5th April.
READ MORE > Posted on 31 August 2023
I’ve had a couple of emails at the tail end of August, asking about how certain expenses are calculated when sole traders are doing their self-assessment tax return. One area that always causes confusion is the ‘use of home’. People usually know that something is offset-able for heating and lighting, but how is this calculated?
READ MORE > Posted on 31 August 2023
Did you know that 17th May is National Numeracy Day? Me neither, but it gives me the chance to point out that there are plenty of resources out there to help people who might be a little scared of numbers. One charity doing good in this area is National Numeracy, a driving force behind National
READ MORE > Posted on 11 May 2023
I suspect everyone poo-poos new tech as a threat to their job until they can see that it really is a moving a big tank onto their lawn. I had a sudden ‘get off my land’ moment just a few days ago.
READ MORE > Posted on 11 May 2023
Income tax years in the UK run (bizarrely) from 6th April to 5th April. And the rules change every year. Sometimes it’s a tweak and sometimes, following a general election, it can be a radical new direction. There can also be ‘interesting’ new directions when the Prime Minister is Liz Truss. That’s another story, so
READ MORE > Posted on 05 April 2023
I get a lot of questions from people on my Finance of Freelancers courses about what happens to tax if you have a mix of PAYE income and sole trader income. PAYE income and sole trader profits are both taxed using the income tax system, which is pretty straight forward. But PAYE income is usually taxed by
READ MORE > Posted on 05 April 2023
If you’re a freelancer it’s good to think like a business, and part of that is keeping an eye on how tax works. You can sometimes save a bit of money just by tweaking your behaviour across different tax years. Yesterday (17 November 2022) Chancellor Jeremy Hunt unveiled the latest plans to deal with the
READ MORE > Posted on 18 November 2022
What to do when you feel your social network no longer cuts the mustard? This is the question loads of people have asked themselves since Elon Musk took over Twitter. For many it seems the answer is Mastodon. I started my training business before social media existed, and usually claim that I only use them
READ MORE > Posted on 07 November 2022