Sensible thread for self-employed people

[Bflatmajorsharp]

Could we have one please?

You know, where we don't have to continually confirm that yes we pay the same taxes as employed people, yes we pay slightly less NI but don't have access to SSP or pension contributions, yes the HMRC does know what we earn as we submit a tax return each year.

It's really struck me this weekend that offering no financial support to the 5million SE/gig workers is a public health issue.

People are still going to work because they can't afford not to. Some London tubes were packed today with people who cannot social distance, not because their jobs are vital but because they cannot afford not to work.

I hope that the govt address this sharpish. It's so dangerous.

I'm SE and I'm convinced they will be announcing this week. I think they covered PAYE first as it would be easier for HMRC to process.

“Statutory self-employment pay
(1) The Secretary of State must, by regulations made by statutory
instrument, introduce a scheme of statutory self-employment pay for
those whose work has been impacted as a result of the coronavirus.
(2) The scheme must make provision for payments to be made out of
public funds to individuals who are—
(a) self-employed, or
(b) freelancers.
(3) Regulations made under subsection (1) may define the meanings of
“self-employed” and “freelancers” in subsection (2).
(4) The payments to be made under subsection (2) are to be set such that
the gross monthly earnings of an individual specified in subsection (2)
do not fall below—
(a) 80 per cent of their gross monthly earnings, averaged over the
previous 3 years (or if records do not date back 3 years, the
monthly net earnings averaged for the period records are
available), or
(b) £2,500,
whichever is lower.
(5) No payment made under subsection (2) shall exceed £2,500 per month.
(6) Regulations made under subsection (1) may provide that payments
made under subsection (2) must be paid back via self-assessment if the
payments were made in error.
(7) A statutory instrument containing regulations under this section is
subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of
Parliament.”

You are all welcome

@adiposegirl where did you get this info?

We are a month behind on our mortgage so can't take a payment holiday so we need a glimmer of hope

TheoriginalLEM
www.parliament.uk/business/news/2020/march/lords-debates-emergency-covid-19-legislation/

Thank you very much

So sole employees, single owners of limited companies who draw a small salary for themselves and rely on dividends (paying corporation tax on the rest) are fucked then?

Employees of limited companies presumably can access the Job Retention Fund to pay their staff? Because, they're employees...?

Yes, they’ve gone out of their way to exclude dividend arrangements.

I think the clause about the self employed has been proposed as an amendment but not by the government

The press are reporting 'expected to be announced'. It hasn't gone through yet but looking more likely.

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/25/uk-government-set-to-pay-self-employed-workers-80-of-earnings

Categories are 'freelancers' and 'self-employed'. I'm not sure how this affects people set up as ltd companies.

i thought it was going to be set up to help small companies too? I.e. limited companies. Otherwise so many people I know are going to be screwed

Nearly half a million people in the UK have applied for UC since March 16.

'Not currently the level of help that they would like' says Therese Coffey.

No shit.

it’s going to have a huge knock on impact in my industry if it doesn’t.

sounds like it could be helpful.

But how do people prove their income for any particular month, if they're freelancers? You can work out your three-year average, and work out what that works out to per month. But since you only report this year's income on a yearly basis, how on earth can you show whether your income has fallen below a certain level or not?

e.g., I get paid in Feb for work that takes me til the end of March. So technically I haven't really been paid much in March, but I'm ok because I have already been paid for the work I've done. April will be much more of a problem. But how can I quantify what I 'should' have earned in April? I guess it will really just have to be averaged out over the whole year or something, and any payments now just seen as potential loans, until you know if you've caught up to at least 80% of your salary by the end of next year or not, and if you have, you have to pay them back. I don't know how my work will be affected in the long run. In some ways, it might be OK in the shorter term while people try out new online arrangements etc, but then drop off as they don't like it, and since I thrive on word of mouth referrals, my income for the autumn might end up being a lot lower as a result. Or not. It's hard to tell for sure.

So I don't know whether I'd want to take any extra payments now, out of fear I'd then end up owing something back at the end of it. But I wouldn't know either way til the end of the tax year next year.

I hope whenever the announcement is made, it is very clear!

It also says that payments 'made in error' would have to be paid back, but doesn't say about payments made because you're not earning much now, but then things pick up again. Especially for businesses that have been getting better year on year.

This is a serious question.

In which sectors have freelancers/SE people's income increased as a result of CV19?

Gig economy take away cyclists/motor cyclists, possibly, or at least remained stable until they need to self isolate for 14 days.

Maybe some people with specialist IT skills?

Who else?

oh also just reading some details of it, and it sounds like it would be for people who have lost all business and are considering closing down.

not people whose work has been, say, slashed in half, but who are still working in the hopes of trying to build up new clients or a new way of online working. or people who end up affected in the future because of the loss of work now - my clients rely on continuity, and if they have 3 months off, won't necessarily come back, so it's actually later in the year that I could be more badly affected as a knock-on effect.

I suspect fewer of us will be covered than hoped.

@bimbleberries so there is a glimmer of hope then!

My husband has just sold his small company after over 30 years and has just, in the past month, gone self employed. Obviously this was at the start of this crisis and so, as well as not having any SE records for 3 years, he doesn’t really have significant SE earnings at all. He’s 60 now with a rubbish pension and the money he received for the sale is destined to fund our retirement. It was not a significant amount either. Where does that leave us regarding the SE help? He’s not able to work now as his line of work is not essential. I work part-time (shut at present) and have applied to a supermarket for temporary work. But it won’t be enough to cover our mortgage, etc.

Oh, totally read that wrong. Maybe not then. Argh. Will have to wait for tomorrow to see what happens. Will keep fingers crossed for us all that something actually helpful is offered.

In which sectors have freelancers/SE people's income increased as a result of CV19?
I LOL'd when I heard this... Maybe cleaning agencies and SE cleaners have seen an increase?

bimbles thanks for that. I haven't read the details, but that's ridiculous.

How do gig economy workers 'shut down' their business?

Well, I guess they de-register their URN, then set up another one when they've got work again.

Apart from maternity allowance, all state benefits are only claimable by SE employed people if they close their business down.

But this isn't a benefit, it's compensation for earnings lost. The same arguments for keeping the economy going stand as for why small businesses are going to be able to keep their staff on at 80% of their current pay.

adipose yes, millions of SE workers income as not been impacted or even increased according to the chancellor.

How he came to that conclusion is anyone's guess.

I'm still confused as to how deferring July's tax payment until January 2021 will help.

It will still be there to be paid within the same financial year.

The FT on this www.ft.com/content/9cc67072-6ea5-11ea-9bca-bf503995cd6f.

Although I like the idea of massively increasing the amount individuals receive in UC payments, and can understand why the Treasury doesn't want to be 'giving handouts to multimillionaires' it's patently unfair that under this scheme SE people will be means tested and not able to claim UC if they have savings in excess of £16,000 while employed people will not.

well I was just reading a summary of the proposals, so none of the details were absolutely certain, of course. I do hope it's better than it sounds.

It was talking about cabbies, hairdressers, etc, who were considering closing up shop because of no work now. But that's exactly the problem with freelancers, what is 'closing up shop'. We all have quieter and busier periods, and how to show that this is significantly quieter than usual. Or that it might not be offset by trying very hard to build it up later in the year - it doesn't mean a payment now was fraudulent or in error or anything. And we get paid at random times, too, and have budgeted around that.. I would have got paid again quite a bit in late april/early may, but then not again til late June. A relatively big payment in May might seem like I was doing OK now but doesn't mean it's actually enough to cover May and June, which is what I would normally budget May's money toward. And Im sure everyone else has various similar arrangements.

So I can see why they were delaying it, to try to work out some way of quantifying things to make it fair. They could just give a one-off payment of 80% of 3 years, for one month, to everyone self-employed, with a maximum of £2500, and then just not worry if some people ended up a bit overpaid with that. And if it carries on, then could consider another one, but let people apply for it if they thought they were still affected, and take it back in taxes somehow if they did end up earning more. I don't know. Feels like there should be a way, but I just have a feeling they don't really understand self employed people - how work comes and goes, pay comes at various times, lower work now can have effect several months from now, etc.

And yes, tax holidays, payment holidays for mortgage etc ,don't really help, because most of us have already worked things out over a year's budget, and all that money is still due. Yes, it would help if there were immediate cash-flow problems, but not for those who are just faced with losing masses of expected income.

re: increase in income due to C19 - I work with online retailers and actually my main client is seeing unprecedented demand for their products in the past week after the stay at home instructions came in, so we are all working a bit more at the moment (most of us work remotely all of the time and only charge for the hours we work). It's busier than Christmas! I know some other businesses seeing the same at the moment, especially anyone offering any kind of food delivery (local veg box scheme, one-person run bakeries who do mail order etc.)

Obviously it's only temporary and long term we are really worried about how a potential recession will affect sales. And my other projects are currently on hold so I'm not personally feeling confident!