Self-employed workers able to apply for a grant of up to £2,500 a month

[Irial]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52053914

Self-employed workers will be able to apply for a grant of up to £2,500 a month to help them cope with the financial impact of coronavirus, the chancellor has announced.

The money will be paid in a single lump sum, but will not begin to arrive until the start of June at the earliest.

Rishi Sunak told the self-employed: "You have not been forgotten."

Plans for 80% wage subsidies for staff kept on by employers were announced last week.

[Haffiana]

There is no minimum. If you only filed one year (18-19) then they will base it on that, and give you 80% of 7k divided by 12 for each month that the scheme runs.

[Lostoldusername]

Does anyone know if there is a minimum amount you need to have earnt before you can claim this grant?
I filed my tax return (only 1yr in) self employed ad hoc nanny. Earnt approx £7k so no tax to pay in the same way as someone on PAYE would not pay any. Wondering if I'm eligible?

[DogInATent]

Why does it not include 19/20? Surely that was filed in Jan for most people?
My 2019-20 accounts and tax year hasn't ended yet. How could I file in January? In January 2020 I filed my 2018-19 self-assessment accounts.

[Blakes77]

It seems unfair...DH's income comes about 45% from being freelance and the rest from being employed albeit on a zero hour contract. So he won't qualify for this grant as the majority of his work isn't self-employed, and on the other hand his employed hours have drastically dropped so we're not sure where he'll stand there.

Same for me, except my casual work has stopped completely. I don't earn a lot in total, but piece together a living from self employment and casual work. I am not PAYE anywhere but work casually for the same employer, not different employers. I declare that as employed income on my tax return.
I'm really confused as to what to apply for! 80% of just my SE income will be sod all really. Maybe I would be better applying for UC, but then can I continue to earn anything from self employment??

[minniemooblue]

@gingerbread88
We are the same. Last year £56k but the two years before that were under.
This bit confused me.

[BarbaraofSeville]

Are we stuffed for any help as his earnings were over the £50k for the last return only

I don't know and I think issues like this are part of why it took them longer to put things in place as it's often not black and white. There's also the potential for people who haven't been SE very long to miss out because they're working on figures at least a year old.

We have a different issue in that in the last few years DP has flitted between employment and self employment in an industry that's been wiped out by coronavirius, festivals and concerts and it's not looking good for the summer as many of the big festivals that are his best earners have been cancelled.

I've just looked through his tax returns for the relevant three years and found that 48% of his total income for those years was from SE and 52% from employment, while for 2019/20 it will be more like 95% SE as he quit a job in mid April 2019 to go back freelance. But this help is for people where the majority of their income is from self employment so on those numbers he just falls short of that.

All we can do is wait, do his tax return for 2019/20 so there's evidence he's now only SE and make an application at the relevant time, hoping that someone actually looks at the figures and there's an element of discretion involved rather than a straightforward 'computer says no' approach.

[Opendraw]

Oh great thanks RUS x

[RUSU92]

I wondered that too how on earth can you prove you have no work coming in?

You can't and you don't have to. There will be very few people totally unaffected or indeed benefitting from this situation. Trying to police that would add an extra layer of complication to this whole thing. You've got to hope that people who don't need it won't claim, but some will of course. They'd spend more on trying to means test it even further.

Also will they take partners earning into consideration.

Do two working people have to take each other's earnings into account before accepting the £2.5k support too? People arrange their life and finances based on their income. Suddenly losing one of them, whether from self-employment or employment will have an impact, and I'm so glad the government have recognised that.

[Opendraw]

The retune is 2018/19

[Opendraw]

Solo self employed people do often have a rainy day fund but this was tsunami . I expect my taxes will now go up and retirement age will probably be 90 so I feel we are entitled to some help for all this reasons. Gahhhhhh

[RUSU92]

Why does it not include 19/20? Surely that was filed in Jan for most people?

Because it goes from April 6th not Jan 1st.
The tax year is 06/04/2019 to 05/04/2020

I presume the people they're giving extra time to are late filing LAST year's accounts.

[Opendraw]

I wondered that too how on earth can you prove you have no work coming in? Also will they take partners earning into consideration.

[Opendraw]

Won’t be much karma as self employed who don’t pay the correct taxes have often done it for years like my DH painter friend. As a self employed person who declares my income it massively f@@ks me off

[gingerbread88]

I'm still a bit unclear on this. My husband is self employed and earned £38,000 2016-2017, £46,000 2017-2018 and £58,000 in 2018-2019 so that was an unusually good year. If they average it by taking the 3 yearly figures and dividing it, he will be under the £50k threshold. Are we stuffed for any help as his earnings were over the £50k for the last return only?
We rely on his income and he is still earning a bit but has already lost income and set to lose more as this carries on.
How do the self employed prove the loss of income too?
Thanks

[StatisticallyChallenged]

My interpretation of the 4weeks grace to file

"We aren't even going to start on this til we've build the PAYE system so we might as well give em a month. Looks dead generous"

[StatisticallyChallenged]

18/19 was jan deadline
19/20 filing opens 7th April

[littlebitwooway]

Why does it not include 19/20? Surely that was filed in Jan for most people? A small amount have not yet but why not? Who are these late people? Small or big businesses? Why do they need 4 weeks to file it? That is rather a long time. Good news though.

[StatisticallyChallenged]

Tbh I am inclined to agree Koalas, and it would have been easier to implement. Possibly with some sort of region weighting to account for housing cost variations.

[StatisticallyChallenged]

We had reserves to allow for reductions in business but with over 200 clients a total cessation wasnt covered by reserves.

We have business interruption insurance to cover for those scenarios only its not paying out. It would if it was smallpox. Or typhoid. Measles. But not a disease which didn't exist...

[KoalasandRabbit]

I agree though that the fairest solution would have been universal and to ensure people had their basic needs covered.

[KoalasandRabbit]

Not really sure why the self-employed are supposed to have predicted a global virus closing schools and economies but the employed didn't need to. Never happened in my lifetime. I have savings for illness but already ill for a couple of years when this happened - it's not instead of that but on top of it.

[rainbowwelly]

And certainly wouldn't have predicted having my kids at home for a huge chunk of time either.

[rainbowwelly]

Slush fund*

[rainbowwelly]

Certainly in my field @SoloSolow there are huge issues with payments being made on time. There's also payment on publication, taking on work, spending on expenses and then the client sitting on the work for months at a time before I can event get paid. I personally have a slush fun but equally, in travel this could take years to get back to getting regular work. I've certainly planned for slow periods and losing work but not the entire industry being taken down for an indefinite amount of time. I don't think anybody could have predicted this.

[SoloSolow]

If you are self employed, shouldn't you have prepared for periods of inactivity, caused by illness, holidays, cancellation of contracts etc. and set aside a rainy day fund?

As another poster has said, maybe the fairest thing to do would be to give everyone the same set amount per week or month.

It is unfair to those who who are expected to continue to live on low benefit amounts whilst the government splashes the cash on other sections of society who have gained the most from capitalism, and at the prospect of living on low benefit amounts have insisted the goverment give them more.

If I was on benefits I'd be fuming.