I'm helping my friend complete her tax return. She's a consultant and works away from home a few nights a week. When she's away is she able to claim the cost of her evening meals?
generally I would say no but have a read of this thread and then either bump it back to the top or put your follow up questions here.
As you'll read, the lunch is a definite no but there are circumstances where the evening meal can be allowable but not if this is a regular pattern of travel and subsistence.
As I say, have a read. Take a look at the links and then repost and we'll chat some more.
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
I always find this a grey area but have come across EIM 31815, which give an indepth view of meals away from the normal work place ( I have not read all the links)
Don't you just love that half of the BIMs and EIMs disagree with each other on this one Bill!
It's an area that I've been around and around and for every statement that it's definitely one way they have another saying the complete opposit.
Just had a read of the EIM and all of the attachments and that suggests that a meal is allowable but as seen before in other HMRC guidance they state categorically that it's absolutely, definitely, 100% not.
AHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhh.......
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
it doesn't help with this specific scenario too much as there is too much contradictory information on the HMRC website. However, all in all for tax I recommend that everyone gets the Kaplan complete text for paper P6 every year. (Also very hand for if you absolutely have to beat anyone to death with a book accept no substitute! its 6cm's of A4 so you really get your moneys worth with this one)
I think that even the advanced tax with the ACCA doesn't cover all of the syllabus of the ATT and I also like the fact that ATT break it down a lot more than ACCA so that you don't go into an exam having to know a bit about everything rather than a lot about a smaller selection of topics. However, regardless I still recomend the Kaplan text as an excellent all round tome of knowledge).
Although I would quite like to be I admit that I'm no tax specialist. However, the frustrated solicitor in me finds that side of things really interesting if at times frustrating when opposing, mutually exclusive stances are all given as fact. So, I am quite looking forwards to one day post ACCA wandering down the ATT CPD route and who knows, I may eventually find a definitive answer to this question that has been done so many times on the site and always causes debate.
hth,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Cheers Shaun, I'll probably get a copy of the dark side tax text but continue to have a look around for something specific on benefits.
On an unrelated note, my neice must have been reading your advice - just had a text and she's got a job today in purchase ledger/credit control. - I'll be directing her here in any case. It's her first job in the sector and she's using the dreaded S*** software.
congratulations to your neice on the new job. No mean feat in these trying times. Hope that she really takes to credit control as it can be a fun role in businesses that don't treat it as a call centre type of role.
She'll also learn a lot data mining and chasing lost transactions.
Good luck to her in the new role.
On the "they who shall not be named" front. I think that their software is fine for small and many mid range companies. It's just their licencing policy for the likes of us that really lights my blue touch paper.
kind regards,
Shaun
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
However, all in all for tax I recommend that everyone gets the Kaplan complete text for paper P6 every year. (Also very hand for if you absolutely have to beat anyone to death with a book accept no substitute! its 6cm's of A4 so you really get your moneys worth with this one)
I'm wondering if the two books I already have from the ICB may have the same material included in them as they are published by Kaplan. What does the FA11 stand for? I'm guessing the 11 part is the year but what is the FA part?
How many pages are in this book? I can't details anywhere (so far). They have the book for sale in many places but never give details.
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Never buy black socks from a normal shop. They shaft you every time.
In this years book there are 1098 pages plus index. Amazon seem to have given up giving the pages for these one's and just give the thickness as 5.6 cm... Its lieing, the book is 6 cm. I've measured it.
For a look inside an old (so useless for tax purposes but good for seeing the format) see here :
it all about calculation and reasoning rather than HMRC forms so suspect there is a different approach from the ICB text although I've not looked at that one so I could be wrong.
hope that helps,
kind regards,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
You won't regret it Peasie (well unless you drop it on your foot!) and while your waiting for the nice Amazon Elves to process your orderTrueman browns blog is excellent... I've cut and pasted it into word and it's 279 pages of sound tax advice in there.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
(if you haven't already)
