Vat as a ltd company can anyone advise?

[MarmiteOnToast]

Recently set up a ltd company. And vat registered.
I have purchased 3.5k in equipment, set up fees, insurances etc etc

I have received approx 2800 in vat from invoices to customers.

How does this all work?

The 2800 i have aside seperate for the Vat to pay this quarter

Go and see an accountant and get them to help

You need a bookkeeping system, you need to make sure your invoices have the correct details on, your VAT account needs to be set up for Making Tax Digital, you need to know when your quarterly VAT returns fall, etc

I have an accountant who does it for me. But in essence I think you deduct the vat you've paid on things you've bought from the vat on things you've solved and give hmrc the difference. VAT is payable quarterly, not monthly.

I submit a VAT return and have a direct debit so they just take what I owe them.

You will also need to pay PAYE and NI every quarter.

Sorry I have an accountant. Haven't given him the invoices / receipts etc yet. This was just going by the figures in my head that ive added up.
Wondering whether they just give the difference to me or i pay the 2800 first. Then get the expenses back at end of yr.
Accountants on holiday until 5th june. So was just wondering that's all

Yes paye and ni is registered ready.
This is nearly my 3rd month trading the quarter is due soon end june

No, you give them what you owe. So if you paid 200 in VAT on the equipment, you will probably owe them about 2,600.

But not everything is counted for VAT so just wait until your accountant is back.

Just fyi, you cannot set up direct debits for paye/ni so you need to go onto the HMRC website every quarter to find out how much you owe. I think you might have to set it to quarterly - think the default is monthly.

I really recommend you get accounting software - I use Xero and it makes everything loads easier.

If your accountant is doing your VAT returns please just send then what they ask for and pay the amount they tell you to. It makes accountants lives so much harder when people start trying to do half a job themselves.

Check if your business is eligible for flat rate VAT. Our business in the the first year of trading paid 10% to HMRC of the 20% we collected, 11% to HMRC now. Make sure you file and pay VAT due in time, set up DD is the easiest way. Of course if you qualify for flat rate, you can’t claim on purchases, so swings and roundabouts.

You/your accountant will do a vat return. Normally on line

Our accountant gets a big bag of receipts and invoices, sorts them out, tells us how much we need to pay, submits vat return and we then do a bank transfer to our HMRC vat account.

Can't remember if you've said you are bat registered as well as ltd, but if not then you need to decide whether you meet the requirements to be vat registered. You can't just claim bat back if you aren't registered.

The vat return is basically a sub total of your total sales and purchases, how much vat you owe (potentially not everything you have bought will have vat on it), you then list the amount of vat you can reclaim (from your sales) . And deduct one from the other. This is how much you pay (or get back).

You need to be able to prove that you've both spent and received vat from suppliers and customers so vat receipts/invoices (with a vat number on them)

Take a look at gov.uk/browse/business

Essentially, it’s worked out as sales or output vat (vat on sales less vat on sales credit notes) minus purchase or input vat (vat on purchases less vat on purchase credit notes). If the answer is positive, you owe HMRC, and if you’ve set up to pay by dd, HMRC will take this a few days after you submit the return. if the answer is negative, HMRC owe you, and again, if a dd arrangement is in place, the money will be paid to you automatically a few days after the return.

Returns and payments are due one month and 7 days after the end of the period, so if your quarter ends 30 June, you will have until early August to sort out the return.

The above refers to the standard VAT scheme. If you’re on cash accounting, annual accounting or the flat rate scheme, there will be differences in how the vat owed is calculated, and the return periods - your accountant will be able to explain all that if necessary.

My procedure is to check all the VAT transactions a couple of weeks after the period end (to give time for everything to be updated/received in post etc), make sure the correct VAT codes have been entered, all the backing documents have been uploaded into the software, query any unusual/doubtful transactions, then run the return, get the director to ok it, and then submit. I would assume that your accountant will do something similar.

The main points are:

1. Make sure all the documents are entered in your software, and filed or scanned in.
2. Make sure the money is there to pay across when the time comes.

It sounds like you’re doing both of those already, which is great.

Yes vat registered.

I was just trying to get a rough figure, not do the works for the accountant that's what I pay him for haha.

I know some of the expenses like the insurance im sure he said can be wholly claimed but may be wrong.

I just give him a folder of invoices in /out, expenses and receipts and will leave him to it

Yes the money is there, the accountant just submits my wage paye and the rest stays in the business account minus the expenses so its definitely in there

His comment about insurances won't be about vat it will be about tax.