The Spring Budget – 2017
Winter is almost gone and it’s time for the Spring Budget again, this comes with a variety of changes:
- Alterations are being made to how tax is handled.
- The way in which compliance is kept between businesses and HMRC is changing.
- Consumers will soon be better protected against fraudulent dealers.
How the Budget Plans to Protect Consumers
The government is beginning to consider methods with which consumers can be protected from being exploited by deceitful companies. The aim is to assign fines to those companies who charge customers unexpected amounts after supposedly free trials to a service, or who continue to charge after a cancelled subscription. Companies that practice dishonesty and treat their clients unfairly will have fines administered to them.
Changes are coming to how , working parents with young children below the age of 12 will no longer have to pay tax on childcare support. Parents of younger children will be able to apply to the scheme first, while every parent will be free from paying childcare tax by the end of the year.
Finance Changes
In the budget, the chancellor has planned some changes to increase the amount of profits small businesses can keep. Personal tax free allowance is being increased from £11,000 to £11,500 between this year and next. The higher rate of tax (40%) will only take effect once an excess of £45,001 is earned, which is £2000 greater than what it used to be. Tax-free dividends are going to be decreased from £5000 to £2000, which reduces the difference between self-employed and workers in company’s dividends.The VAT registration threshold is also increasing to £85,000, whilst the threshold for deregistering will be changed to £83,000.
Changes to national insurance contributions will involve the abolition of the Class 2 NIC band. NI will no longer need to be paid on profits which exceed £5965.