News

SPRING BUDGET 2023

After presenting a Budget-in-all-but name with the Autumn Statement, the Spring Budget was delivered against the backdrop of a day of widespread industrial action. The run-up to the event appeared deliberately downplayed, save for a late flurry of leaks highlighting a focus on childcare at one end of the scale and pensions at the other. While acknowledging the Prime Minister’s two objectives of halving inflation and reducing debt, Mr Hunt focused his Spring Budget on the Prime Minister’s third objective – getting the economy going.
In a wide-ranging and longer than usual speech, there were some key headline items:
• The inflation rate is forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility to fall from 10.1% (January 2023) to just 2.9% by the end of 2023.
• The lifetime allowance for pensions will be abolished from April 2024, with the lifetime allowance charge withdrawn from April 2023.
• A new monetary limit for the tax-free pension commencement lump sum will be introduced for 2023/24 of £268,275 (equivalent to 25% of the current standard lifetime allowance).
• The annual allowance for pensions will increase by 50% to £60,000 from 2023/24 and the money purchase annual allowance will rise from £4,000 to £10,000 from 2023/24.
• Companies investing in new plant and machinery in the three years from 1 April 2023 can claim a first-year allowance of up to 100% of expenditure.
• Small and medium-sized enterprises that spend 40% or more of their total expenditure on research and development can claim a tax credit worth £27 for every £100 they spend from April 2023.
• The energy price guarantee is maintained at the current £2,500 level until the end of June 2023.
• Up to 30 hours of free childcare per week will be available to working parents of children from the age of nine months by September 2025. Initially, from April 2024, working parents of two-year-olds will be able to access 15 hours of free childcare per week.
• The scheduled 11p a litre duty increases in petrol and diesel will not go ahead.

Our full budget briefing can be downloaded here

The Scottish Budget – 15 December 2022

The Deputy First Minister, John Swinney, set out “four important factors” in arriving at the
measures announced in the 2023/24 Scottish Budget:
The pressures on the public finances mean that in some cases, the Scottish
Government’s plans will need to be delivered on a longer timescale than originally
envisaged.

The requirements for public sector reform, set out in the Medium Term Financial
Strategy and the Resource Spending Review, will become ever more necessary. The
Scottish Government will act in a way consistent with the principles of the Christie
Commission, placing “significant emphasis” on early intervention and prevention.

Significant increases in input prices and energy costs mean that the capital budget
will be unable to deliver as much as would have been considered possible only a few
months ago.

An uncertain inflation outlook, and the need to still conclude some current year pay
deals, mean that a public sector pay policy for 2023/24 will not be published until
the new year.

Full details of the budget can be downloaded here

The Autumn Statement

The Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, was faced with a challenging economic backdrop to his first major set piece, grappling with a combination of over 11% inflation, an official recession and the need to calm markets and re-establish the UK’s financial credibility following the turmoil of September’s ‘mini-Budget’.
The key announcements covered a wide range of ground:
• The main income tax allowances and thresholds, the main national insurance thresholds and the IHT nil rate bands will remain frozen at their current levels for an extra two years until April 2028.
• The threshold for the 45% additional rate of income tax will reduce from £150,000 to £125,140 from April 2023.
• The dividend allowance will be halved from April 2023 and again the following year.
• The capital gains annual exempt amount will be cut from £12,300 to £6,000 for 2023/24 and halved to £3,000 from April 2024.
• From April 2023 the energy price guarantee will be adjusted upwards, costing typical households an additional £500 from the current position.
• State pensions will increase under the ‘triple lock’ in line with the 10.1% September CPI inflation figure, alongside universal credit and certain other benefits.
• Business rates will be updated with additional targeted support over the next five years.
• Electric cars will come into the tax orbit for road tax from April 2025.
With a full Budget still likely in the Spring, there is much to inform your tax and financial planning for the remainder of the current tax year.

Our summary of the Autumn Statement 2022 can be downloaded here

‘The Growth Plan’ – a further update 17 October 2022

At 6.00 am on Monday 17 October, the Treasury issued a press release announcing that the (new) Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, would making a statement “bringing forward measures from the Medium-Term Fiscal Plan”. The timing of the press release suggested that the Treasury was concerned it had not done enough the previous Friday to calm markets ahead of the end of Bank of England gilt purchase support.

The Chancellor’s statement was in two parts: firstly, a pre-emptive media statement in the morning, then an official statement to the House of Commons in the afternoon. He announced what amounts to a near total unwinding of Kwasi Kwarteng’s ‘fiscal event’ of 23 September.

Full details can be accessed here.

The Growth Plan – an Update 14 October 2022

On 14 October, as an important deadline loomed for Bank of England support of the government bond markets to expire, the government’s political turmoil ratcheted up as the fallout from the ‘fiscal event’ of 23 September claimed its first scalp.

Full details of the reversals can be found here.

‘The Growth Plan’: 23 September 2022

Kwasi Kwarteng’s first set piece as Chancellor of the Exchequer was never going to be easy,
even before the 0.5% increase in interest rates the day before. The new Prime Minister Liz
Truss revealed much of what we might expect before Mr Kwarteng spoke a word, so we
already knew that there would be:
• a two-year £2,500 Energy Price Guarantee (EPG) for consumers;
• similar but shorter-lived support for businesses and other non-domestic energy users;
• cuts to National Insurance Contribution (NIC) rates; and
• a reversal of the planned April 2023 increases in the rate of corporation tax.
Nevertheless, Mr Kwarteng’s launch of ‘The Growth Plan’ contained some surprises,
including the reversal of recent changes to IR35.

Please note the following:
• Changes to income tax rates only apply to savings and dividend income for Scottish tax residents.
• The tax rates for non-savings income in Scotland are unaffected by this announcement
• Changes to stamp duty are not applicable to Scotland
A copy of our update can be found by clicking here.

Energy Costs Statement

After a prolonged period of speculation, the new Prime Minister Liz Truss has announced preliminary details of how the government plans to deal with the energy price crisis.

A briefing note on the plan is available to download here.

Summer Client Newsletter

Our latest client newsletter is available for download.

It covers Changes in NIC, Preparing for MTD for Income Tax and Car or Van Questions

Download here

Fundraising for Support in Mind Scotland

Maria our CA graduate apprentice has shaved her hair to raise funds for Support in Mind Scotland

We are happy to share the before and after photos.

If you wish to support her efforts click on the link below

£5,800

We can’t thank everyone enough for their efforts and the generosity of everyone who sponsored us to raise funds for Pancreatic Cancer UK & Cancer Research UK in memory of Hilary and Catherine.

Thank You.

Charity Walk 24 September 2021 £3500 raised to date

Thank you to all those who sponsored us on Friday. We had a good day with the weather, our support team and the good wishes of those who joined us and encouraged us on the way round. The trip took us just under 4 hours not including our welcome break at Burleigh Sands for coffee and cake, thanks to Connor, his mum, Kay & Nick and the staff who baked. We would also like to thank Imagin Products Ltd for our fabulous Tee Shirts.

Thanks again for your support

Charity Walk Coffee Break

Charity Walk Start

Office Charity Walk 24 September 2021

Thanks to great support from our clients, over the last few years the office and staff have raised around £10,000 for MacMillan Cancer Support by holding Coffee Mornings at Cupar and Markinch. The last one was held in September 2018.

Two wonderful people, with close connections to the office, have died since then from cancer and we have decided that we want to raise some money for Pancreatic Cancer UK and Cancer Research UK in their memory.

They were Hilary Green Marshall who died from pancreatic cancer on 4 July 2019.
As well as being a client, the office stationery supplier and a retained firefighter she was a brilliant friend. Her support was invaluable when I was setting up the office and she was the very first client to sign up with the new business. In recognition of this she was invited to every staff Christmas outing!

Catherine Juskowiak died from liver cancer on 20 May 2021.
She was closely connected to the office through her work for a client and a great supporter of us, again particularly in the early days of setting up the business. She was a lovely person and my best memory is discussing the funniest episodes of Frasier with her.

To raise money for Pancreatic Cancer UK and Cancer Research UK, we are doing a sponsored walk for the 13 miles round Loch Leven on Friday 24th September 2021. We are starting from the car park at Vane Farm at 9.30am and walking clockwise around the loch. There will be a tea, cake and water stop at Burleigh Sands car park.
We would love you to sponsor us and if possible join us for all or part of the walk (or cycle!).
Every penny donated will go to help fund research into this terrible disease.

If you have any queries please contact anyone at the office.

Tax Brief September 21

Our latest newsletter is now available

Highlights include:

Going digital in advance of MTD
Money back for working from home
'Super' Capital Allowances
VAT changes for the hospitality sector

The newsletter can be downloaded here

Tax Briefing June 2021

Please down load our newsletter which covers

Business Rates on empty properties, Umbrella companies, CGT on sale of second homes and MTD for VAT

Please download by clicking here

Yvonne Gray Dance Christmas Video

We thought we should have something nice on our website for Christmas!

Below is a link to the Yvonne Gray School of Dance video

Christmas Video

Happy Christmas

Best wishes for 2021

Spending Review – 25 November 2020

HIGHLIGHTS

No tax announcements, although the Chancellor noted that “we have a responsibility … to return to a sustainable fiscal position”.
Government borrowing projected to be £394 billion in 2020/21 before stabilising at around £100 billion from 2023/24 onwards. Total debt to remain over 100% of GDP.
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) says that “a fiscal adjustment of £27 billion” will be needed as a minimum in the medium term.
New UK Infrastructure Bank to be established in the north of England to start work in spring 2021.
Public sector pay to be frozen for a year, other than for NHS employees and those earning less than £24,000 a year.
National Living Wage to increase by 2.2% to £8.91 an hour from April 2021 and the minimum age at which it applies is reduced to 23.
Overseas aid to be cut from 0.7% of GDP to 0.5% in 2021.

Full details are available by downloading the attached file Spending_Review_2020.pdf

Coronavirus Restrictions Fund

What does this involve?

The Scottish Government has announced £40 million in funding for businesses and employees in Scotland affected by the temporary coronavirus (COVID-19) brake restrictions that came into effect from 9 October 2020.

The support funds will be administered by local authorities, providing one-off grants to hospitality and other businesses required to close by the brake restrictions regulations. Applications open on 20 October 2020

Click here to see full details and application procedures

Winter Economy Plan – 24 September 2020 HIGHLIGHTS

Winter Economy Plan – 24 September 2020 HIGHLIGHTS

• A new Job Support Scheme, primarily targeted at small and medium employers, will be introduced covering employees who work at least one third of their normal hours
• The Chancellor confirmed that the furlough scheme will end on 31 October.
• The Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) will be extended to April 2021, with a revised basis.
• The closure date for the four existing business loan schemes will be extended to the end of November.
• Repayment terms for the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) and Bounce Back Loans (BBLS) will be relaxed, with the maximum term extended to 10 years.
• The reduction in VAT to 5% for the hospitality and tourism industries will be extended to 31 March 2021.
• The deferred VAT and self-assessment payments due early next year can be repayable in instalments rather than as a lump sum.

Our full brief can be downloaded by clicking winter economy plan.pdf

We are changing our name

The office is pleased to announce that as of 1 September 2020 Barry has become a partner in the business.

To reflect this our name is changing to Cunningham Grant Chartered Accountants

We will be changing our website, email, note paper and signage over the next few weeks.

There is no change to our addresses or phone numbers.

In ‘normal’ times we would have a get together at both offices to celebrate this good news but this is not possible in the current circumstances. Instead we are going to do an office calendar this year and will be sending you a copy later in the year.

We are sure you will agree this appointment is well earned and a good move to ensure the long term future of the business

Tax Briefing June 2020

he latest version of our newsletter is now available

This release contains articles on Self Employed Grants, VAT Rates, SSP CIS and Off Payroll Working

Please download our latest newsletter by clicking: June Newsletter

COVID 19 4 June 20 Update

Covid-19_Measures_Update_29_May.pdfThis is the latest summary we have of all the government initiatives to support business. There are 2 documents, one gives an overview of the ongoing changes and clarification at the UK level, including the changes to the Job Retention Scheme and the Self Employed Income Support Scheme. The second is a Business Gateway document that lists all the schemes available in Scotland, this is updated regularly so for updates please click on link below.

Business Gateway Information Sheet

As always let us know if we can be of help with any of the points in these documents.

Covid-19_Measures_Update_29_May.pdf

Covid-19-Business-Support-Summary-as-at-02-06-20.pdf

Covid-19 measures to 27 April 2020

This is the latest summary we have of all the government initiatives to support business.

. Bounce back loan scheme launched with 100% government guarantee.

· Possible shape of Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme after the end of June.

· Abandonment of requirement for forward-looking financial information or business plans when applying for business interruption loans.

· Temporary ban on use of statutory payment orders and winding up orders for non-payment of commercial rents.

· Government’s business support finder tool introduced.

· FCA confirms three-month payment freeze for motor finance, buy-now pay-later, rentto-own) and pawnbroking agreements.

· One month interest-free payment freeze for high cost short term credit ordered by FCA.

· Promise from Chancellor of more detail on Self-employed Income Support Scheme in the coming week.

Full details in the latest briefing below

Covid-19_Measures_to_27_April_2020.pdf

Second phase of funding to protect businesses against the effects of COVID-19 in Scotland.

Around £220 million of further grants are being made available for businesses - including the recently self-employed - to help them deal with the ongoing impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

The new package of measures includes £120 million to extend the Small Business Grant scheme to ensure that, in addition to a 100% grant on the first property, small business rate payers will be eligible to a 75% grant on all subsequent properties.

A further £100 million fund is also being made available to protect self-employed people and viable micro and SME businesses in distress due to COVID. This fund will be channelled through local authorities and enterprise agencies to target newly self-employed people and businesses who are ineligible for other Scottish Government or UK Government schemes.

Applications for the £100 million fund will be open by the end of the month, and the new arrangements for the Small Business Grant will be in place to receive applications on 5 May.

COVID 19 6 April 2020

HMRC have just updated the guidance on the Corona Virus Job Retention Scheme.

Whilst all the guidance has been refreshed, the main areas we would draw your attention to are:
• the more detailed information on scheme eligibility
• further information on how to calculate a claim
• clarification of what constitutes wages.

Please find the link below

Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme

COVID 19 3 April 2020

This week’s update contains a number of links

HMRC has published new online guidance on 3 April 2020 which includes information about who can use Coronavirus Statutory Sick Pay Rebate Scheme and the records employers must keep.

The updated Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS)

An assessment tool (created by sage) which allows you to check that you have considered all the available support for your business

Coronavirus: UK government funding support tool.

We are still waiting for the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to go live, the current advice is available by clicking here.

COVID 19 27 March 20

The Government have published the first guidance for the Job Retention Scheme; they hope to have this live by the end of April.

They have also announced the Self Employment Income Support Scheme. The key issues for this are

1 You will be contacted if you are eligible (beware of scams)

2 It is limited to sole traders and partnerships with trading profits of £50,000 or less

3 It will be paid in June

Full details are in the attachments

Self Employment Income Support Scheme

COVID 19 Summary of Government Measures

COVID-19 Self-employment Income Support Scheme Claims

This scheme will allow you to claim a taxable grant worth 80% of your trading profits up to a maximum of £2,500 per month for the next 3 months. This may be extended if needed.

You cannot apply for this scheme yet. HMRC will contact you if you are eligible for the scheme and invite you to apply online.

You can apply if you’re a self-employed individual or a member of a partnership and you:

· have submitted your Income Tax Self Assessment tax return for the tax year 2018-19

· traded in the tax year 2019-20

· are trading when you apply, or would be except for COVID-19

· intend to continue to trade in the tax year 2020-21

· have lost trading/partnership trading profits due to COVID-19

Your self-employed trading profits must also be less than £50,000 and more than half of your income come from self-employment. This is determined by at least one of the following conditions being true:

· having trading profits/partnership trading profits in 2018-19 of less than £50,000 and these profits constitute more than half of your total taxable income

· having average trading profits in 2016-17, 2017-18, and 2018-19 of less than £50,000 and these profits constitute more than half of your average taxable income in the same period

If you have not submitted your Income Tax Self-Assessment tax return for the tax year 2018-19, you must do this by 23 April 2020.

How much you’ll get

You’ll get a taxable grant which will be 80% of the average profits from the tax years (where applicable): 2016 to 2017, 2017 to 2018 & 2018 to 2019

It will be up to a maximum of £2,500 per month for 3 months.

They will pay the grant directly into your bank account, in one instalment.

If you’re a director of your own company and paid through PAYE you may be able to get support using the Job Retention Scheme.

The full link is here

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/claim-a-grant-through-the-coronavirus-covid-...

Help with non-domestic rates in Scotland during coronavirus (COVID-19)

It is now possible to apply for the grants from 24 March 2020 and they will be available to 31 March 2021.

To help owners of non-domestic properties, including businesses, deal with the impact of COVID-19, the Scottish Government has made changes to non-domestic rates (business rates) for 2020-21.

The Scottish Government has introduced extra rates reliefs (discounts). It has also introduced a one-off grant for some businesses.

These reliefs will be available to non-domestic properties from 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021.

Please follow the link below for full details.

https://www.mygov.scot/non-domestic-rates-coronavirus/

COVID 19 23 March 20

As outlined we want to provide you with updates and potentially useful information for your business.

The Chancellor has set out a package of temporary, timely and targeted measures to support public services, people and businesses through this period of disruption caused by COVID-19.

This includes a package of measures to support businesses including:

· a Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme

· deferring VAT and Income Tax payments

· a Statutory Sick Pay relief package for SMEs

· small business grant funding of £10,000 for all business in receipt of small business rate relief or rural rate relief
Below is a link to the Fife Council page relating to this, at present they have no information about how it will be paid.

https://www.fife.gov.uk/kb/docs/articles/business2/business-rates/covid-...

· grant funding of £25,000 for retail, hospitality and leisure businesses with property with a rateable value between £15,000 and £51,000

· the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme offering loans of up to £5 million for SMEs through the British Business Bank. Below is a link to the British Business Bank.

https://www.british-business-bank.co.uk/ourpartners/coronavirus-business...

· a new lending facility from the Bank of England to help support liquidity among larger firms, helping them bridge coronavirus disruption to their cash flows through loans

· the HMRC Time To Pay Scheme

Full details and links are in the document below.

Covid 19 230320

COVID 19

At this time of unprecedented disruption we wanted to update you with information about measures we are putting in place and provide some useful links for information.

As of 23rd March 2020 we will move the majority of our staff to remote working and provide a skeleton staff in our Cupar office. The Markinch office will be closed.

Please contact the Cupar office to arrange handing in books and records.

We would encourage the use of our secure online portals and emails to share any documentation whenever possible in communications with us.

The office phones will continue to be answered during our normal working hours, and we will respond to emails as usual. Rest assured, we will continue to do all we can to support your business.

We are getting our updates from the official links below

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance-for-emp...

https://www.gov.scot/news/gbp-320-million-package-of-support-for-busines...

https://www.acas.org.uk/coronavirus

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/tax-helpline-to-support-businesses-af...

We hope that the above may be useful for you in these challenging times. We wanted to assure you that we intend to manage any consequences for our clients and our people. If you have any questions, please continue to speak to us.

Tax Briefing February 2020

The February edition of our newsletter is now available

Articles cover CGT, IR35, NIC Thresholds, Employment allowance and CT Penalties

The briefing is available by clicking here on the link below

LynnCunninghamCharteredAccountantFeb2020.pdf

Video

Our CA Graduate apprentice has created a video about the office, you can view it by clicking here

Enjoy

Pay a Virtual Visit to Our Markinch Office!

We're proud to be the first accountant in Fife to have the Google Streetview team photograph our business.

See below (or click here) to try it out and have a look around our Markinch office, and see if you can identify the people behind the calculators! (Streetview doesn't include faces for privacy reasons.)

If you'd like to see the office in person, just drop by, or give us a call - contact and location details are over here.

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