Can't believe my cleaner just asked me this?!

[marplessparkles]

Cleaner texted me to ask if I could pay her cash this week (£60). I said sure, is it just for this week or is this something you want to do every week?

She replied if I could do it every week because she found out she and her partner can get housing benefit if she can prove she has a lower income, so obviously not declaring or paying tax on her cash jobs.

I'm a bit On a moral and ethical level I can't see how she is so blatantly happy in doing this; ripping of hard working taxpayers and councils who will have to fund her benefits.

AIBU to let her go?

If I was going to commit benefit fraud the last person I'd tell is a wealthy client with a big house

Exactly ! 😂😂😂

Your cleaner should have kept her trap shut

'I find it hard to get excited about benefit fraud on this scale when big business avoids tax perfectly legally via loopholes the time and it's not just a few quid a week - it's millions'

Benefit fraud is benefit fraud at the end of the day and the more that can be done to suppress it the better. I would rather see a business get away with paying less tax who employs people which is keeping the economy moving.

The thing is, people have been going on about it long enough and with the right organisation behind it and some hard line tactics heading it up you could eradicate it completely from society. Without it you would create better people who pass on that honesty to their offspring.

You just need to take more control of people's lives, cease giving money and use a voucher system for essential items only to sustain health as in parts of the US do. And obviously don't pay cash for services or work. You need to remember you have paid tax on the money you are giving them so why should'nt they?

Not everyone who gets paid in cash is a tax avoider. A lot of my tutoring clients pay me in cash because it's more convenient for them. I declare everything to HMRC and pay what I am required to.

I pay my cleaner cash, I pay my window cleaner cash, I don't enquire of their personal financial situation.

I wouldn't fire either of them and I wouldn't report them even if I did know. Maybe growing up in a council house in Glasgow showed me another side of life, and I learned not to judge until I fully understood the situation. Sometimes it's not what it seems. From an abusive partner forcing the claim, to caring for elderly parents, or even a disabled child. For me, sometimes there is extenuating circumstances, that the law may or may not recognise, but I personally would to the extent I wouldn't fire or report unless I was absolutely sure I knew all the facts.

I'd simply text the cleaner back and say happy to pay cash but uou should be honest in regards benefits and leave it to her.

These threads rarely end well.

But I have no problem paying cash to anyone. Who am I to judge if they are tax compliant or working on the black. None of my fekkin business.

I get a service, I pay for it. We all know that certain occupations are cash only. Get a life some of you pearl clutching judgemental superior wannabes.

Oh and tell the nanny to sleep on a camp bed with little food and work twenty hours a day, that's if she's not shagging your husband in which case it would be fifteen hours a day LOL.

Oh and while my dander is up, she is not "your" cleaner. She is "the cleaner"

Just thought that might make the person feel she is not anyone's chattel.

fulloffun

I have known several friends husbands who were shagging the Au pair, cleaner, in fact they were so fed up with their moaning Po faced wives, who had no time for their husbands, who could blame them.
Oh dear, maybe some people on here need to check on their dh behaviour.

Fulloffunreally, I know it wasn't your intention but your post made me smile. For what it's worth I have neither cleaner nor nanny (nor pearls) and the only cash-only jobs I know of are the dodgy blokes who offer cheap tarmac-ing door to door. If someone wilfully avoids paying into the system they can't complain that the same system doesn't support them.

"I'm impressed at how virtuous others seem to be."

Naive more like.

The benefits system is far too generous???????

Words fail me

Why are you implying it is not?

Seems to work as a pretty good job title for plenty in the UK, with longevity of prospects for the foreseeable future.............

I had someone in the house laying a floor who asked for cash as "otherwise the CSA will find out how much I earn, know what I mean, hahahaaaa."

Presume all the posters on here who think the benefit claiming cleaner is OK also think good luck to that bloke too?

It is to my lasting regret that I didn't tell him that he'd put me in a difficult position as my DH was high up in the CSA (I was clearly a SAHM so couldn't have claimed this for myself).

I see your point, red, and it's a good one about keeping the economy moving.

But we need to look at the root cause of fraud in this sense.

Mostly, it's down to having a very low income and finding a way of supplementing it. Not always, but that's a huge element.

And often the tax avoiding, low paying and somewhat greedy businesses are partly to blame.

When the government planned to up the minimum wage, a lot of companies found ways around keeping employees pay the same. One example was a big retailer taking away paid tea breaks from those already on the lowest scale

Benefit fraud is benefit fraud at the end of the day and the more that can be done to suppress it the better. I would rather see a business get away with paying less tax who employs people which is keeping the economy moving

What? So you'd rather people, on the lowest income struggling to make ends meet, miss out on a little extra cash to stop them from needing to go to the food bank that week, or buy new school shoes for the kids, or hell, even just have a small amount of joy in their life, be fucked over than for companies who have enough money to avoid taxes (because the ones we hear about are always the big ones) so they can have bigger profits which might, in a very imaginative mind, trickle down enough to provide jobs for lowly people? That's a bit fucked up. I don't support benefit fraud but I'd much rather let someone off on that, than let a big company off on their taxes.

I had someone in the house laying a floor who asked for cash as "otherwise the CSA will find out how much I earn, know what I mean, hahahaaaa."

Now that's different, that's not someone trying to make enough money to take care of their children, that's someone trying to make money in a way that doesn't take care of their children.

If our whole economy is on the back of big business 'seeing themselves right', we can't really complain when individuals start doing it

There would be a lot less fraud if there were a fairer distribution of wealth

Exactly gandalf

HMRC do not pursue those who pay cash, only those who do not disclose it on receipt for services provided.

There is no law that says a person should not pay cash. The tax liability or potential benefit fraud is on the part of the person who is the recipient only.

Maybe if there was a law that says a person procuring services should ensure that every provider is tax compliant, or not claiming benefits things would be different.

The world would fall apart. What would the pearl clutchers do OMG!

As it is, it is up to the service provider, and personally I have no qualms about paying cash to cleaners, window cleaners. It is NOT my problem how they arrange their tax affairs or their benefit entitlements.

fulloffun
"In general (unless an employee of a cleaning company) I doubt there would be many independent cleaners around the place if they had to keep books and do a self assessment return every year for HMRC

It's really easy keeping account of what you earn and completing online self assessment. I'm a cleaner/house keeper for several people, paid cash by one, transfer by others and the occasional cheque. It all gets declared.

I had someone in the house laying a floor who asked for cash as "otherwise the CSA will find out how much I earn, know what I mean, hahahaaaa."

@toldmywrath

Good on you. I wasn't suggesting that EVERY cleaner was working off the books at all. But in fairness a lot are. As are other occupations aswell.

The issue is for DWP and HMRC. Why should a service recipient worry, if those Departments are not doing their job in finding out whether someone is tax compliant, or is committing benefit fraud?

The responsibility is on Government Departments IMV.

I used to work in an industry where people used to pay cash for my services because they believed it would be cheaper, you wouldn't declare it.
It surprised me which type of households these were tbh.
I don't like generalising because there are 2 sides to every story so it's stupid, but there were on average more mc families offering cash than others but, they were maybe the largest market I had.
My dh is in similar industry and it's not individuals suggesting this, it's other companies.
When he declares his income it isn't his fault if the company who paid him pretend the transaction never happened.
Fraudsters will be caught out in the end, HMRC don't want pearl clutching wanna be Miss Marples.

I had someone in the house laying a floor who asked for cash as "otherwise the CSA will find out how much I earn, know what I mean, hahahaaaa."

vestalvirgin
As long as it is not written down, OP could always deny having ever been told, and there are many, many people who pay their cleaner cash without any intention of helping with tax evasion. How could they possibly know that the lack of invoice has anything to do with evading taxes?

The problem with this is that the cleaner is quite happy to open her gob to blab that she intends to fleece benefits, so what makes you so sure she won't grass on the OP and say she KNEW she was cheating the system?!

I am amazed at the amount of people on here who think it's OK for someone to fleece benefits because she's a cleaner, whilst calling people 'pearl clutchers' and 'judgemental' for saying they would report the woman.

If it was any other job, and someone was ripping off the taxpayer by cheating the benefits system, most people would be mortified and think it was a disgrace. Yet because she is a cleaner; it's OK.

tootsiepops
I operate a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy with my cleaners. One is a stay at home mum with three kids and one on the way. If she's not paying her taxes, I don't give a shit. I'm pretty pissed off that we're all so concerned about what our neighbours are potentially doing or claiming that we're all distracted enough grassing one another up, leaving the government and big business to do what ever the fuck they like.

Congratulations! You are enabling benefit fraud!

Firstly, how can your cleaner be a stay-at-home-mum if she works as a cleaner?

Secondly, why do you assume that people who are pissed off about cleaners fleecing benefits don't give a shit about big business dodging tax?! Bit of an assumption there! Just coz someone is pissed off about a cleaner fleecing benefits, that doesn't mean they don't care about big businesses dodging tax!

The OP said she is her cleaner's only client. I bet the she isn't.

redpoll
There's an awful lot of people posting on here who have cleaners. I wonder if I am missing out on something here.

I noticed that too. Never had one in my life. Always worked, raised 2 kids, never even thought about having a cleaner. Never known anyone else with one either.