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PAY-BACK TIME?
Know the rules on directors’ loans or the S455 tax could bite
Directors of limited companies can pay themselves
in three ways: a salary, a dividend or an expense
repayment. They can also repay themselves money
they have previously loaned to the company. Any
money that is paid from the
company to the director(s)
or other close family
members outside of
these methods is called
a director’s loan.
In these circumstances, section S455
of the Corporation Tax Act will
come into play, commonly called
‘S455 tax’ by accountants and
advisers. From April 2016, S455
tax moved from 25% to 32.5%.
This tax is in place to stop directors
from paying themselves through
loans that are not repaid in a bid
to try and avoid income tax and
NI charges on dividends or salary.
In fact, the S455 tax rates mirror
the higher rate dividend tax rates –
therefore, if it is never paid back it
is like taking a dividend. The only
difference is, if the loan is repaid
then the S455 tax comes back.
So…
If the director repays the loan within nine
months of your corporation tax accounting
period
Claim back the 32.5% corporation
tax that you have paid on the loan, but not
the interest. There are no personal tax
responsibilities.
If the director doesn’t pay back
the loan with nine months of
your corporation tax accounting
Period
Claim the corporation
tax back on repayment of the loan,
but not the interest. Interest on
the corporation tax will be added
until the
corporation tax or the loan is
repaid. There are no personal tax
responsibilities.
If the loan is written off (ie never
paid back)
Class 1 NI must be
deducted through the company’s
payroll and the director has to pay
income tax on the loan through their
self-assessment tax return.
If the loan reaches more than
£10,000
Then the loan would
be considered a benefit in kind and
the company would have to deduct
class 1 national insurance.
From April
2016, S455
tax moved
from 25%
to 32.5%.
Get in touch to see how this affects
your company.
NO ROOM FOR ERROR
Take care to check your
VAT return carefully as
mistakes will cost you
In the Spring Statement 2018, the chancellor
announced consultations on future changes
to the VAT threshold, because of suggestions
that the current threshold may discourage small
businesses from growing.
If you have already reached the VAT registration
threshold, do you rely on someone else to
complete your VAT return or do you sense check
it before it goes to HMRC? If not, penalties can
be applied for up to 100% of tax understated
or overclaimed if you send a return with a
careless or deliberate inaccuracy. It is therefore
always worth doing a high-level sense check of
the numbers in line with what you as a director
know about the business performance and versus
previous VAT returns.
In a recent HMRC tribunal, one director of a
computer equipment supplier claimed to rely on
another member of staff to complete the VAT
return which had missed more than £50,000
of sales. This was not seen by HMRC as a
reasonable excuse for the error as a quick check
against the sales books would have made the
mistake very apparent. Therefore, lack of care
had led to the penalty
From April 2019, legislation will require
businesses above the VAT threshold to have a
digital tax account and file quarterly returns
online (see page 4), which will greatly help VAT
checks. More of your electronic transactions will
be visible to HMRC but this also makes it easier
to check for errors before submission.
KEY AREAS TO CHECK
• Compare to previous VAT return and
check if movements look reasonable.
• Investigate any significant
unexplained variances.
• For standard rated output, box 1
should be 20% of box 6.
• If box 8 is a higher value than box 6,
or box 9 is more than box 7, you may
have put the figures the wrong way
round in error.
• Have you adjusted for credit notes
received and issued in boxes 1 and 4?