Why isn't there a Tax Cheats Hotline to report builders...

[Bakelitebelle]

.....carpenters and other workmen, who ask for payment in cash and sometimes take VAT off if you pay them cash?

Tax cheats the lot of them. Why all the threads getting sniffy about benefit fraudsters when Tax fraudsters cost the country billions?

From the independent in 2010: "An estimated £15.2bn in VAT receipts was not collected by tax officials last year ? equivalent to one-sixth of the money that should have been due, and a sharp increase on £11.7bn the year before. The finding chimes with a recent study which concluded that the "informal economy" represented about 14 per cent of Britain's gross domestic product."

I like internet banking for things like this. Immediate transfer (they know they have the cash), you have an audit trail (from both ends, in case there is a subsequent dispute) and no need to for them to go and pay in a cheque, or you to wait weeks for someone to cash one you wrote.

Trouble is, a lot of folk are very traditional. I had a plumber who sent a bill 2 weeks after the work and only accepted cheques which they didn't cash for weeks. The next one was happy to be paid instantly and give me a signed receipt before she left the building.

Tax evasion via cash-in-hand payments to contractors is also unfair competition for the honest trader who plays by the rules.

It's not just home owners that do this sort of thing...

At the moment a lot of my work is for local authorities - schools and social housing - and it amazed me to find out the hurdles they are obliged to make their contractors jump through to be able to work for them:- VAT registered, CIS registered, CHAS registered, CSCS cards, Companies House registered, CRB checks, written policies on: H&S, equal opportunities, waste management, membership of trade bodies like Gas Safe or NICEIC, the list seems endless.

Yet a Head teacher can just ring up someone from an advert in the free paper and get them to do work their schoo - i.e spending public money on public buildings without any of the above.

This happens time after time and is grossly unfair.

Kelly, part of the problem is that many of the services that you are referring to are essential, and should be VAT exempt IMO anyway.

Tradesmen will often charge less if you pay cash and not bother putting it through the books, but when you are paying VAT on something that you can barely afford anyway, paying a little less and turning a blind eye is going to seem like a fairly attractive option.

I have paid less to plumbers to have our heating fixed before, but being able to heat your house is a basic need and you shouldn't have to pay VAT to get it. It's something so essential that they give out benefits for it FFS, so I cant understand why we should have to pay tax on getting warmth and hot water.

Same goes for plumbers fixing toilets. Sanitation is a fairly basic need too.

They make children's clothes VAT exempt because they are a nessesity, they should do the same for other neccesitys. That way people wouldn't feel so ripped off by the amount they have to pay for basic things, that are often unexpected costs, and would be encouraged to report tax dodgers.