Plant and Machinery purchases
If you are planning to purchase plant and machinery in the near future there are planning opportunities available to ensure reliefs are utilised efficiently.
Slough Office: Herschel House,
58 Herschel Street, Slough SL1 1PG
London Office: 10 John Street,
London WC1N 2EB
Slough Office: Herschel House,
58 Herschel Street, Slough SL1 1PG
London Office: 10 John Street,
London WC1N 2EB
If you are planning to purchase plant and machinery in the near future there are planning opportunities available to ensure reliefs are utilised efficiently.
The limit has been raised to £1,000,000 capital expenditure on plant and machinery (subject to certain exclusions).
We have the expertise to give you the advice that you need to make smart choices for the future.
Get in touch and see what we can do for you.
These are available at 18%.
Integral features:
Many farmers are looking to convert their farm buildings to provide an extra source of income.
If you do, make sure you get a full break down of all costs spent as reliefs are available for integral features, but not for buildings themselves.
Integral features are:
A writing down allowance of 6% is available on these items.
The AIA is available against integral features also.
Structures and building allowance Since 29 October 2018, if you have paid some or all the costs towards the purchase, construction or renovation of the structure you may be able to claim 3% (previously 2%) relief for the costs you incurred.
There is 100% relief available for plant and machinery purchased that is considered to be energy saving. Therefore, it is a good idea to consider carefully when purchasing any equipment as you may be able to claim back the full cost.
For a full list of items that qualify go to www.eca.gov.uk/etl/criteria
There are restricted tax reliefs for the purchase of cars, however vans are considered to be plant and machinery and therefore attract all the reliefs mentioned previously.
The following vehicles actually qualify as vans and therefore may be worth considering for tax purposes: Land Rover Defender and Mitsubishi Warrior.
All UK farming is treated as the carrying on of a trade and due to the nature of this trade losses can occur for which there are various loss reliefs available.
However where losses are sustained in farming activities of an essentially non-commercial nature, i.e. hobby farming, reliefs may fall to be restricted essentially preventing offset against non-farming income.
The five year rule restricts relief where tax adjusted losses before capital allowances were incurred in each of the five previous years of assessment.
Some farmers take on large numbers of workers at harvest time. Some of these casuals turn up for work without prior agreement or receive piece work payments.
In brief, employers should keep records of the names, addresses and amounts paid to employees concerned, so that a return can be made when required.
VAT
Cash accounting:
It is usual to calculate VAT on a quarterly accruals basis, but if you are in a position where there are bad debts or cashflow is tight the cash accounting scheme may appeal – in order to be eligible to use these your taxable turnover must be below £1.35m.
The cash accounting scheme means that you only account for VAT actually received and paid as opposed to invoiced. This means that if you suffer a bad debt you get immediate relief in terms of the VAT element.
Monthly returns
If you are regularly in a repayment position ensure you have applied for monthly returns to enable you to receive your VAT refunds quicker.
Inheritance tax
Modern farming trends are leaning towards the use of farm buildings for non farming activities e.g. renting. This can affect the property’s entitlement to Agricultural Property Relief (APR) and Business Property Relief (BPR).
For example, a cottage or farmhouse that is occupied by someone not employed in farming won’t qualify as agricultural property unless the occupier is:
Agricultural Property relief (APR)
This relief was essentially set up to assist the passing down of farming property through the generations.
APR is available on the agricultural value of agricultural property which is transferred. The agricultural property can be owner-occupied or let. Relief is only due if the transferor has owned the property and it has been occupied for agricultural purposes for a minimum period.
The relief operates by reducing the value transferred by a transfer of qualifying agricultural property.
Relief is available for transfers in life, on death and when agricultural property is chargeable as settled property. However if a partially exempt transfer becomes chargeable APR conditions still have to be met at death for retention of the relief.
BPR is similar to APR but is not restricted to agricultural property.
Again, the value of the transfer of relevant business property is reduced by BPR in lifetime and if a gift becomes chargeable this relief is retained if the conditions are still met in death.
If you plan on exiting your farming business through a sale, then entrepreneurs’ relief will be available, subject to certain conditions. This relief will reduce the gain either on the sale of the shares in your farming company or on assets disposed of as part of the sale of the farming business.
Roll over relief is a further capital gains tax relief available when business assets are sold.
If you’ve reinvested all of the proceeds from the sale or disposal in new business assets, you’ll be able to ‘roll-over’ (or postpone) all of the gain and there’ll be no tax to pay until the replacement asset is sold.
You may still be able to postpone part of the gain if you only reinvested part of the proceeds – or if your old asset has only partly been used for your business, e.g. you rented out a property for a time and then started using it in your trade.
Individuals carrying on a qualifying trade (intensive livestock or fish rearing to produce food) are able to claim average profits over two or five consecutive years if certain conditions are met. This can result in a lower tax bill across the period.
The two-year averaging provisions can be used where profits of one year are less than 75% of the profits of the other year or where the profits of one year are nil.
The five-year averaging provisions can be used where the ‘volatility’ condition is met. The volatility condition is that:
If a loss is made one year this is treated as a nil profit for the purposes of the above.
To find your nearest office or get in touch with one of our specialist advisors to see how we can help your business, please go to our contact page.