Sole trader accounts in Hellesdon

Self-employed people in Hellesdon trading in their own name: tradespeople, drivers and couriers, hairdressers and beauticians, consultants, creatives, market traders, therapists, tutors and anyone else running a business without a limited company, from a first-year side business to an established trade with a van, equipment and a few thousand transactions a year.

• Income and expenditure account for the tax year or your accounting period, with a balance sheet where you want one
• Every expense category reviewed for what is allowable, including home working, vehicles and the trading allowance
• Capital allowances on equipment and vehicles, with the cash basis or accruals basis chosen to suit you
• A plain-English summary: profit, tax and National Insurance due, payments on account and what to put aside
• Figures prepared in the format the Self Assessment self-employment pages need
• Records organised and stored so that an HMRC check can be answered quickly

1. Tell us your situation

   A short message or call about what you do and what needs filing. We ask the questions that determine the right package and nothing more.

2. Fixed fee in writing

   You receive one price for the work, confirmed by email before anything starts. It does not change if the job takes longer than we expected.

3. Send records, review the draft

   Records come by WhatsApp or email. We prepare the draft, explain the figures in plain English and answer your questions.

4. We file, you get the receipts

   Once you approve and the fee is settled, we submit electronically and forward the HMRC or Companies House acknowledgement the same day.

Hellesdon is in East of England, in the NR6 postcode district, England. Income tax in England follows the UK rates: 20% basic to £50,270, 40% higher to £125,140 and 45% additional, with the personal allowance of £12,570 tapered away above £100,000. National Insurance, VAT and Corporation Tax are UK-wide, and Stamp Duty Land Tax applies to property purchases.

The Self Assessment calendar

Four dates govern Self Assessment: 5 October to register, 31 October for paper returns, 31 January to file online and pay, and 31 July for the second payment on account. Missing the January date triggers an automatic £100 penalty before any tax is even considered, so we treat it as the fixed point around which the rest of the year is planned.

Payments on account

Payments on account catch out most people in their second year of self-employment. HMRC assumes next year's tax will match this year's and collects half in January and half in July, in advance, on top of the balancing payment. If profits are dropping you can apply to reduce them, but reducing them too far attracts interest. We calculate the right figure rather than guessing.

Late filing penalties

HMRC's penalties for a late Self Assessment return are automatic: £100 the day after 31 January, £10 a day from three months late up to £900, then the greater of £300 or 5% of the tax at six and twelve months. Interest and separate late-payment penalties apply to the tax itself. Companies House charges £150 to £1,500 for late accounts, doubling for a second consecutive year.

Making Tax Digital for Income Tax

MTD for Income Tax replaces one annual return with quarterly digital updates and a year-end declaration, submitted from software. The threshold is gross trading and property income, measured two years earlier, and started at £50,000 in April 2026 before falling to £30,000 in April 2027. Anyone affected needs digital record keeping in place before their start date, not after.

The VAT registration threshold

Watching the rolling twelve-month turnover figure is one of the quiet jobs of monthly bookkeeping, because the £90,000 VAT threshold arrives silently. Crossing it brings quarterly returns, Making Tax Digital software and a decision about schemes. Crossing it late brings a bill for VAT you could not recover from customers and a penalty for failing to notify.

Corporation Tax rates and marginal relief

Corporation Tax is not a flat rate. Profits to £50,000 pay 19%, profits above £250,000 pay 25%, and the band between is taxed at an effective marginal rate of 26.5% through the marginal relief mechanism. Associated companies share the thresholds, which catches directors who own more than one company and is the most common cause of underpaid tax in owner-managed groups.

Salary versus dividends

The salary-and-dividend split is the central planning decision for an owner-managed company. Salary costs employer National Insurance above £5,000 but is deductible; dividends are not deductible but attract lower personal rates and no National Insurance. The optimum changes each April with the thresholds and depends on the director's other income, so it should be set deliberately every year.