the advisor
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Word of the week: CONTINUALITY
to be happy that the applicant is aware VER SINCE THOSE NICE APP of their tax obligations and willing to do the people lost their Supreme Court right thing. If the licensing body is unable to case, I have been kinda busy on obtain confirmation of tax check completion my status consultancy work, so for 28 days, licenses will either be denied or I thought for my article it would be nice to will be allowed to expire. take a break and focus on the other impending Bang, there it is. Another measure that horror on my mind. could severely affect your company, that is This is something I have spoken about before, not of your making. Well as the saying goes, but now, either by hard luck or misfortune, there Gary Jacobs do what you can do, but don’t sweat the stuff is a whole new twist. Firstly, after a damn hard you can’t (genuinely the worst paraphrase of slog through the Covid-19 pandemic, our reward Gary Jacobs Desiderata ever. Look it up). as an industry that is trying to re-attract so many runs Eaziserv, an So here is what you need to do ready for drivers lost to us (by necessity) to parcel and food accountancy firm April 2022. deliveries and just plain old unemployment, the specialising in government brings us Continuality. u D on’t be shy about sharing the information. the taxi and private Basically, we know that every self-employed You are genuinely helping drivers out. person must do a tax return and that some This does not affect your or their status, hire business people, believe it or not, including drivers in our it’s just information. eaziserv.co.uk industry, are still not known to the taxman. u M ake sure your drivers know this. Just a Which is why Continuality (sometimes also tiny plug– there is a ‘how to do your taxes’ referred to as Continuity) legislation is on its downloadable video on our YouTube page. The way. To be fair, it’s not so much the principle as the timing. Eazitax Group (driver onboarding video) Continuality will introduce a check on tax registration (tax u M ake sure you incorporate this into onboarding every new check) for renewed applications for licences to: driver. u drive taxis and private hire vehicle u O nce again, asking drivers for UTR (Unique Tax Reference) u operate a PHV business Number to make sure they are registered, is not invading An applicant who wishes to renew a licence will need to carry their rights, it is avoiding problems. Sometimes love is out a tax check. The licensing body (typically a local authority) ‘tough love’, but the results are the same. will have to obtain confirmation from HMRC that the applicant THINGS NOT TO DO: has completed the check before being able to consider their u I gnore the problem renewed licence application. u A sk drivers to sign a contract to say they are self-employed, The government is doing this as a response to the hidden as that doesn’t help them, and it certainly doesn’t help you. economy, which they believe exists as a result of a confusion It’s also no defence in a tribunal. and a lack of understanding about tax obligations. Making As you know, we are accountants, and to put this into access to licenses conditional on a tax check certainly makes perspective, during the pandemic, those that were properly it more difficult for people to enter or remain as part of the registered, really benefitted from the self employed grant hidden economy. (SEISS), and especially those taxpayers that didn’t underSupposedly It also creates a more transparent industry. declare their income benefitted in full from what the HMRC And as usual, it’s not about the had to offer. government’s unwillingness to put You can’t get tax credits without it resources into the HMRC. It’s about our and it is hard to buy or rent big stuff unwillingness to ‘dob in’ our fellow man. without having a set of accounts, According to HMRC, licensing bodies even as a sole trader. In conclusion I will signpost first-time applicants to would repeat what I said that it’s not HMRC guidance about tax obligations. so much the legislation, it’s the timing This is to “obtain confirmation that they for operators and their journey back to are aware of what is expected of them normality and driver numbers. before considering the application”. As they say, if you are affected by The tax check will be carried out by anything you read in this article, providing enough information for HMRC contact the writer for advice.
“The licensing body will have to obtain confirmation from HMRC that the applicant has completed the check before being able to renew...”
JULY 2021
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