Budget 2017 - Tax & Rate Updates!

Corporate Tax Measures

The Chancellor announced that the Government is committed to continue to have the lowest corporate tax rate of the G20 major trading nations.  As already announced the corporation tax rate reduces to 19% from1 April 2017 and then to 17% from 1 April 2020.

The corporation tax rate for small and medium sized companies trading in Northern Ireland will be reduced so that such companies can compete with those in the Republic where the rate is 12.5%.

The Government is also keen to continue to encourage investment in research and development (R&D) and the Chancellor announced that the R&D tax credit claim procedure would be simplified.

Tax Free Childcare Scheme Starts 2017

The chancellor also announced that the new tax-free childcare scheme is due to start in 2017.

The scheme will provide up to £2,000 a year in childcare support for each child under 12 where the parents save in a special account. If they save £8,000 the government will top up the account with 20% to a total of £10,000 which can then be used to pay for childcare costs.

Business Rates Relief For Small Businesses

There has been much lobbying from the small business sector to reduce business rates. The Chancellor stated that 600,000 small businesses currently benefit from small business rates relief.

He also announced that no small business that is coming out of small business rates relief will pay more than £600 more in business rates this year than they did in 2016/17.

In order to support the licenced trade from April 2017, pubs with a rateable value up to £100,000 will be able to claim a £1,000 business rates discount for one year.

Advisory Fuel Rate For Company Cars

These are the suggested reimbursement rates for employees' private mileage using their company car from 1 March 2017.

Engine Size	Petrol	Diesel	LPG
1400cc or less	11p		7p
1600cc or less		9p
1401cc to 2000cc	14p		9p
1601 to 2000cc		11p
Over 2000cc	22p (21p)	13p	14p (13p)

Where there has been a change, the previous rate is shown in brackets.

You can continue to use the previous rates for up to 1 month from the date the new rates apply.

New Vat Limits

As mentioned earlier, the VAT registration limit increases by £2,000 to £85,000 from 1 April 2017. At the same time the de-registration limit increases to £83,000.

Contact us if you need more information or business help:
APJ Accountancy | ☎ 020 89310165 | ☏ 07900537459 | ✉ info@apjaccountancy.com

New Inheritance Tax Rules, VAT Flat Rate & Advisory Fuel Rate 2017

Passing On The Family Home

New inheritance tax rules for passing on the family home start on 6 April 2017 and many people have a New Year’s Resolution to either make a Will or update their Wills. This new relief should be taken into consideration when drafting your Will and we can work with your solicitor to make sure it is tax efficient.

From 6 April 2017 a new nil rate band of £100,000 will be available on death where your residence is left to direct descendants. This is in addition to the normal £325,000 nil rate band and will increase over the next 4 years to £175,000 in 2020. You may recall that when this was originally announced in summer 2015 the chancellor said that a married couple should be able to pass on their family home worth up to £1 million free of Inheritance tax.  The rules are fairly complicated and HMRC have recently issued guidance on how the new relief will operate. We can review your personal circumstances to ensure that you take advantage of all relief that you are entitled to.

Downsizing To A Smaller Property

One of the features of the new inheritance tax rules for passing on the family home is that the relief is protected even when you downsize to a smaller property.

For example if a married couple currently live In a large house worth  £800,000 and downsize to a flat worth £300,000 they could give away some of the proceeds during their lifetime and yet still benefit from inheritance tax relief based on the higher valued property.  They could even sell up completely and move into a rental property and get the inheritance tax relief!

This would very much depend on the timing of such planning and, as mentioned above, the rules are very complicated so contact us to discuss how this can apply in your family circumstances.

More on the New Higher Vat Flat Rate Percentage

As covered in the Autumn Statement newsletter a new VAT flat rate of 16.5% applies from 1 April 2017 for “limited cost traders”. This is being introduced as HMRC believe that the current system is being abused by some businesses providing their labour but who have very few costs.

The flat rate scheme was originally introduced as a simplification measure for small business as they merely pay a percentage depending on the type of business to their VAT inclusive turnover. For many businesses this process takes about 5 minutes but in future they may have to add up all the input tax on their expenses and deduct that from the output tax on their sales which will often take a lot longer!

Take for example a training consultant who bills his clients £100,000 a year, £120,000 inclusive of VAT. Using the flat rate scheme he currently pays 12% to HMRC = £14,400.  If the VAT inclusive cost of his goods for the year is less than £2,400 (2%) excluding capital expenditure, food, fuel, vehicle costs then he would have to pay £19,800 to HMRC!  It would almost certainly be beneficial for him to stop using the flat rate scheme.

If you are currently using the VAT flat rate scheme contact us to discuss whether the changes will apply to you.

Advisory Fuel Rate For Company Cars

These are the suggested reimbursement rates for employees' private mileage using their company car from 1 December 2016. Where there has been a change the previous rate is shown in brackets.

Engine Size	Petrol	Diesel	LPG
1400cc or less	11p		7p
1600cc or less		9p
1401cc to 2000cc	14p (13p)		9p
1601 to 2000cc		11p
Over 2000cc	21p (20p)	13p	13p