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Spondoo Accounting
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Spondoo Accounting

useful guides

Spondoo

Food & Drink Costs and their different treatment for Tax - Getting Food and Drink the policy right

This is a brain dump of the various times food is acquired in the business and how it needs to be treated in the accounts. Ideally, all businesses need a proper process for tracking these categories individually but many fall short of this.
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VAT on fintech Start-Ups - be aware of the Partial Exemption for VAT

If you are building a fintech business, your VAT world is likely more complex, as you need to be aware of what parts of the financial services sector your business serves. Many financial services businesses are exempt from VAT and as such cannot charge or reclaim any input VAT. This article considers the partial exempt scenario where you need to consider whether or not you need to operate a hybrid VAT model.
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Choosing a name for my Limited Company - search tool to check if it exists already

Choosing a business name in the United Kingdom (UK) is an important step when setting up a limited company. When choosing a name, you need to ensure the company name is not already in use.
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Can my employee log in to Zoho Books to send bills and sales invoices without having access to my reports and banking data?

As the admin of your Zoho organisation, you can assign users in your organisation different roles and limit what they can access.  This article explains how.
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Zoho Autoscan Receipts – how to scan and upload receipts and invoices

The Zoho Autoscan feature automatically scans and captures information on receipts and invoices to create expenses.
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Can I remove the Zoho branding from my Sales invoices?

Yes, you can remove the Zoho branding, but you will need to be on a paid plan to do this. Follow the following steps:
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When you breach the VAT registration threshold, when is your Effective VAT Registration Date?

If you breach the mandatory VAT registration threshold in a given month, your Effective VAT Registration Date will be the first day of the second month following the month of the breach.
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Can you claim tax relief for the cost of food when your job requires you to travel to different locations every other day/week?

Usually yes! Whilst you need to be careful with claiming food costs, as it can be difficult to prove that they are wholly and exclusively for business (given you need to eat to survive), HMRC has a term called itinerant in nature.
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HMRC Flat Rate Scheme percentages for businesses not listed as Limited Cost Business

HMRC Flat Rate Scheme percentages for businesses not listed as Limited Cost Business.
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How to upload receipts and invoices to Hubdoc

In the past 40 years, the accounting world has evolved from paper ledgers to spreadsheets to desktop accounting software. We are now in the cloud computing world, where businesses of all sizes use cloud accounting systems. As a small business, you will have several factors to consider when choosing the best accounting software for you.
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What is the De Minimis Exemption for Share Buybacks?

When a company buyback its own shares from capital (as opposed to distributable profits) they are required to obtain statement from the active directors, formal shareholder approval, an auditors report, and file a public note in the Gazette. This administration burden as well as the potential costs from the auditors can be avoided via the Share Buyback De Minimis Exemption.
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Do Dormant Companies need to register with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO)?

Find out if your dormant company needs to register with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).
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How to refresh Zoho Books Bank Feeds in the United Kingdom - what to do when Token expires

In Zoho Books, you may have to manually reauthorise your bank feeds from time to time if the feeds are not being fetched automatically. The process you use to refresh your bank feeds will depend on if your Token is working, it is about to expire or has already expired. This article explains what to do in each case.
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Do the Export of Services sales count towards my VAT registration threshold?

No (well, not usually), you do not need to add export services to business customers when computing your turnover for the mandatory VAT registration threshold (that is £85,000 for 2022-23). This is because the export of services is considered to be out of scope for VAT.
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Do Exempt Sales count towards my VAT registration threshold?

Find out if Exempt Sales count towards your VAT registration threshold.
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How to change your address with HMRC

How to update your new business address with HMRC
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Building an Office in the Garden - what tax can I claim?

If you are running your business from home, this article attempts to explain the tax implications of: Building an office in your garden and paying for the costs via your limited company, or via your self-employment business. Ongoing running costs of this purpose-built workspace in the garden.
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Business rates - Working from home

Business Rates when working from home.
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What do I need to do with my Recon & Bills to Pay I received from the Spondoo Bookkeeping Team?

If Spondoo runs your bookkeeping, you should have agreed on the dates in the month that you are due to receive bookkeeping reports that include your Recon & your Bills to Pay Reports.
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How to find my lost National Insurance Number (NINO) or Apply for a new one 

A National Insurance number (NINO) is the number given to you by the UK government to keep track of your tax record and benefit entitlements. The Department of Work & Pensions (DWP) (England, Scotland, and Wales) and the Department for Social Development (DSD – for Northern Ireland) will issue you a National Insurance number (NINO) just before your 16th birthday if your parents made child benefit claims. If your parents or guardians have not claimed child benefits, you must apply for a National Insurance number - if you intend to work in the UK.
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Unpaid Share Capital & the Directors Loan Charge (455)

As a result of a 2014 First Tier Tribunal, there is technically no law or tax rule that stops unpaid share capital from remaining in your books indefinitely, as it was found that the monies owed by shareholders was a liability to honour an investment, not a repayment of money borrowed from the company
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VAT Annual Accounting Scheme

The Annual Accounting Scheme is one of HMRC’s VAT schemes designed to help small businesses by providing an increased degree of certainty of cash flows, as well as a reduced compliance burden. Unlike the usual VAT-registered businesses that submit their VAT Returns to HMRC 4 to 12 times a year, businesses under the Annual Accounting Scheme can do the following: Put forward a VAT return once a year. Submit advance VAT payments towards their VAT bill depending on their turnover. Established businesses make payments based on their last return, while businesses that are new to the scheme will calculate their payments based payments on their estimated turnover.
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What is Petty Cash (Fund)?

Petty Cash (also known as Petty Cash Fund) is a small amount of money kept on hand by a business to cover trivial expenditures. Often, the company will keep the cash on its premises for incidental purchases during office operations. To avoid mismanagement of these funds, a company should have tight control over the fund to ensure legal accountability - for tax purposes.
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Why has my net pay increased from July 2022?  

The government temporarily increased the NIC Primary Threshold and Lower Profits Limit for the 2022/2023 tax year from 6th July 2022. This means you will likely experience a change in your take-home pay on and after this date – depending on how much you earn.
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Getting SEIS & EIS Approval (Advance Assurance from HMRC)

EIS and SEIS advance assurance is a provisional confirmation from HMRC indicating that an investment meets the qualifications of SEIS or EIS schemes. It is usually a letter from HMRC, following an application from a company, that shows if you buy shares in the said company, you (investors) can receive potential SEIS and EIS Tax Reliefs.
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Is your business eligible for EIS & SEIS?

SEIS and EIS are government-approved tax-relief incentive schemes designed to encourage investment into early-stage businesses. For your business to qualify for either SEIS or EIS - it must meet some requirements – as discussed in this article.
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What are the tax benefits for investors under the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) and Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS)? 

Find out the tax benefits for investors under the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) and Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) - Income Tax Relief, Capital Gains Tax, Inheritance Tax, Loss relief Tax, and the initial capital risk.
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When you are paying for items on behalf of a client - is it a disbursement or simply part of your service (recharge)

As a VAT-registered small business owner, you may incur some costs when providing a service to your client. If you have agreed with your customer that you will pass those costs to them on your invoice, it is crucial to understand the difference between disbursements and recharged expenses.
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Time limit on VAT late claims! How far back can I go to claim input VAT?

Under normal circumstances, your business should claim back VAT on the VAT return for the period incurred. However, sometimes you can fail to claim VAT in the proper VAT period, following different circumstances. Luckily you can still reclaim the input tax in a later return or via a standalone claim – this practice is commonly referred to as a ‘Late Claim’. This article talks about the time limits of reclaiming late VAT – and what is (or is not) allowed.
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How do my Zoho Expenses Reports appear in Zoho Books?

First, you need to check the integration is set up within Zoho Books by going to Settings > Integrations > Zoho Expense to see if the integration is active. 
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Buying an Electric Car (EV) through your business

Since the introduction of Telsa driving the modern EV market, the option to buy an electric car through your limited company looks more and more attractive than a petrol or diesel car.
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How long does it take to Close (Strike Off) my limited company

To close or strike off your own company from Companies House, you can complete the form DS01.
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How to cancel your VAT registration

You can voluntarily apply for deregistration if your VAT-registered business’s turnover falls below the deregistration threshold of £83,000.
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How can I change my Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR) number?

Naturally, you may want to change your UTR number if you have had financial trouble or have faced convictions or penalties relating to your tax activities and would like a new start. You may also be thinking of creating a new one if you have lost your current UTR number. This article talks about what to do in each case.
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How can my limited company reimburse me for using my own car for Business Activities

If you prefer to have the company reimburse you for business travel where you use your own car, you can reimburse the actual receipts for fuel, or use HMRC’s approval mileage rates.
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Buying a car through your business - limited company

As a limited company director, it is crucial to understand that buying a car through your limited company is a complex decision that requires a lot of consideration.
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Company Founders Beware! HMRC’s PAYE Cap Trap - R&D Relief & Tax Credits for Seed or Pre-Seed Start-Ups

For accounting periods which began on or after 1 April 2021, the claimable tax credit payment for loss-making businesses is limited to £20,000 plus 300% of its total PAYE and National Insurance Contributions. They can only claim an exemption from this cap if the business can prove it is creating or actively managing intellectual property with less than 15% of its R&D costs are subcontracted or using employees of a connected party.
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Why is HMRC asking me to file a Tax Return? Who needs to file Self Assessment'

If you receive income or capital gains that do not have tax automatically deducted via your employer’s payroll/PAYE system you will need to report this under a self-assessment. The Self-Assessment personal tax return informs HMRC about your taxable income and gains for a tax year and is submitted online or by paper annually.
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Have you lost access to your HMRC gateway? This is how to recover your HMRC online services user ID and password

HMRC will lock you out of your account if you enter the wrong user ID or password five times. Losing access to your Government Gateway can be frustrating - luckily, it is recoverable.
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When do I need to leave the VAT Cash Accounting Scheme?

When using the cash accounting scheme and part of a growing business, it is vital to monitor the taxable turnover of your business, to ensure you are fully prepared when you reach the opting out limit.
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Information provided on the site is merely guidance that may change in line with UK law and regulations. Users must not consider this to be financial advice or their sole resource when making any financial decision. Spondoo is a trading name for Accounting SQL Limited, authorised & license accounting firm under the Institute of Financial Accountants.
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