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Paul Maina

About Paul Maina

Paul has been with us since May 2015 when he joined as an Accounts Assistant. He is currently studying his final Professional Accounting Qualification AAT Level 4. He has shown great enthusiasm in learning and has been involved in assisting not only within the Accounting Department, but also within the Tax Department and other departments of the business allowing him to understand the company even better. Some of the duties involved in his day to day activities include: Business development through meeting potential/new clients & maintaining existing client relationships On boarding new clients and assisting in drafting client Engagement  Letters Liaising with HMRC and Companies House on behalf of clients including new company incorporation and assisting disqualified directors Preparing client personal Income and Expenditure Accounts using Ms Excel from "shoe boxes full of receipts" Assisting the Accountant with preparing clients year end company accounts (before Trial Balance) and also assisting with Director Loan Accounts Assisting the Tax Manager with computation and preparation of drafting personal tax returns on HMRC portal - Clients include: Buy to Let (Non Resident and UK resident) Landlords, Owner Managers/Directors and Sole Traders Computing and submitting VAT returns Bookkeeping - recording financial transactions on computerised accounting software : SAGE Credit Control - invoicing clients and chasing for payment Marketing - blogging on social media platforms work related articles

Posts by Paul Maina:

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HMRC investigates small firms’ card records

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HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) is monitoring credit card records in a £100m crackdown on small firms it suspects are failing to declare payments.

 

The Revenue has revealed that it is studying the number of card payments recorded by companies including newsagents, restaurants and garages to see if they match up with the profits that they declare on their tax return.

 

It estimates around 30% of sales made at most small businesses are paid for in cash, and that many companies may not be declaring all of these payments on their returns.

 

If HMRC finds that a firm has recorded 90% of its transactions as card payments, it could raise a red flag and trigger further investigations.

 

Chas Roy-Chowdhury, of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, said: “This Big Brother approach is concerning.

 

“HMRC has made it clear it is not 100% sure how good its data is. The taxman needs to be sure business owners don’t end up being wrongly vilified.”

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Taxing time for the company car

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News Feed From Norton Folgate

The Times’ Abigail Townsend talks to motor industry experts about the possible effects of a government clampdown on salary sacrifice schemes for company cars.

The scheme was introduced in 2002 to encourage the take-up of low-emission cars while the employee pays less income tax and both employee and employer pay less NI.

Experts say the scheme had a big effect on people’s tax and in cutting emissions, but the government ended up losing out on the tax revenues. Deloitte estimates that about 500,000 company car drivers could be affected by the proposals. “It makes the decision to give a car as a perk a harder and harder thing to do, so the market will be affected,” Mike Moore, head of car consulting at the firm, said.

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Offshore tax dodgers face harsh new penalties

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News Feed From Norton Folgate KPMG is warning that UK taxpayers with offshore holdings could soon be subject to new legal obligations after HMRC launched a new consultation to tackle offshore tax evasion and non-compliance. Proposals include a new “requirement to correct” obligation which would mean anyone with UK tax irregularities related to offshore interests now has a legal obligation

to correct this by September 30, 2018. Failure to comply could result in penalties in the range of 100% up to 200% of the total amount; a further 50% penalty if steps have been taken to try and avoid reporting; an asset-based penalty of up to 10% of the asset value; and naming and shaming the individual concerned. Beatrice Friar, head of private client advisory for KPMG in Scotland, said: “This is the latest example of HMRC drawing in the net around offshore aspects of tax evasion, and confirms that voluntary disclosure is the only acceptable option in today’s tax transparency environment for those with issues to resolve.”

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Brexit – BCC says minimum wage plan needs rethink

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Update from Norton Folgate

The British Chamber of Commerce (BCC) says the government must overhaul its minimum wage policy following the Brexit vote.

The business group said the “politically driven” approach to setting the national living wage – due to increase to around £9 by 2020 – could become unaffordable as the decision to leave the EU ushers in a period of uncertainty. It warns that pressing ahead with increases towards the £9 target would hit smaller businesses hardest.

These account for 99.3% of all private sector businesses and employ more than 15m people, according to the Federation of Small Businesses.

George Osborne claimed that raising the minimum wage would help to transform the UK into a “higher wage, lower tax, lower welfare” economy.

However, the BCC says the policies introduced by the Government to cushion the burden of higher costs, including cuts to corporation tax and extending employment allowances, do not fully offset the burden.

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Making Tax Digital regime – Doubling Cash Basis Accounting threshold for unincorporated businesses

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Accounting Web News Bite:

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has produced a package of reform proposals to simplify the taxation of unincorporated businesses ahead of the migration to quarterly digital tax reporting.

The main plank of this simplification drive will be to raise the ceiling for the current cash basis mechanism that that allows businesses with trading income to calculate their tax liabilities based on amounts actually paid and received within a period.

It is currently available up to the VAT registration point of £83,000, but HMRC is consulting on raising it to as much as £166,000, double the existing figure. The popularity of the cash basis in its current form encouraged the MTD team to consider expansion, particularly since regular reporting updates will align more easily with the cash approach.

“Businesses who account this way will simply enter the details of their income and expenses as they actually receive payment or pay for an expense,” the HMRC consultation paper explained.

Doubling the upper limit would extend the cash basis option to another 175,000 business; those with higher turnovers are more likely to have complex tax affairs requiring accruals accounts for other purposes, it added.

An exit threshold at around twice the entry threshold is also being considered that would allow businesses with fluctuating turnovers up to £300,000 to continue to use cash basis accounting.

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Britain ‘Open For Business Despite BREXIT Concerns’

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A news bite from Norton Folgate.

New research by the Business Growth Fund (BGF) has revealed that business leaders in the Midlands still think Britain is a good place to establish an enterprise, despite concerns regarding Brexit.

Three quarters of respondents to BGF’s latest Growth Climate Index said Britain is a “great place” to start and grow a business, while 41% admitted postponing “key” business decisions in the run up to the EU referendum.

Some 92% expect a short-term dip in economic growth as a result of the vote to leave the EU, while more than half (53%) expect growth to fall in the longer-term.

Gavin Petken, regional director of BGF for the Midlands, said: “Unsurprisingly, the poll highlights the concerns businesses have in regards to future economic uncertainty.

But there is also a strong and clear

message among respondents that the fundamentals that make the UK so attractive to growing businesses have not disappeared.”

Elsewhere, GAA‘s Robert Outram speaks to CAs and other experts in the wake of the Brexit vote to find out what the UK’s future outside of the EU means for business.

Brexit might affect the way the UK adopts international financial reporting standards, according to ICAS, with the possibility that new standards could be adopted directly by the Financial Reporting Council rather than via the EU – with

potential European opt-outs – as at present.

   

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