Would I need to claim extra earnings if I did surveys?

[Redhothoochycoocher]

I'll have a few free hours everyday and thinking of doing the surveys I've seen on here or something like that. Need to do a bit of research. But I was wondering, how do you pay tax on the earnings? Is it like being self emplayed and so I'd do a tax return next Jan? I've got a job so I'm above the tax free limit

You can earn £1000 / a year on top of your earnings before having to do a tax return.

Oh right - thank you. I didn't know that.

It would depend on whether this is classed as 'earnings' or 'winnings'.
I suspect it would be winnings, because the payment is not guaranteed and is somewhat dependent on luck.

With winnings, it would be treated the same as lottery winnings, and other types of betting, (including matched betting, which I've found much more profitable and less time consuming than surveys). You only need to declare if it takes you over the savings limit - so if you built up a pot of savings of £6,000 or more.

I do a self assessment tax return and declare it on that. I've been doing it for 12 years now and phoned HMRC when I started doing it to check whether I needed to declare and they said I did. AFAIK nothing has changed since then. I would phone them if I were you - I see a lot of people confidently asserting that you don't need to declare it but if you are sent a survey invite and you complete the survey without screening out and get given an amount and you eventually obtain enough to cash out either in the form of a voucher or money in your bank then at that point (the cashing out) it's earnings in my book.