When you are self-employed it can seem really complicated when it comes to claiming expenses. However, the good news is that there are plenty of guides online that can help straighten everything out and make life much easier. Of course the easiest option is always to hire an accountant to help you with all of this and take care of things for you.
Can You Claim Dinner?
One of the things that people often get confused about is what they can claim as business expenses. This can help save you money on the tax you have to pay at the end of the year, so it’s a big deal.
As a general rule you can claim back something that is exclusive for the purposes of trade. This can get confusing when it comes to food and drink. We all need food and drink, so can this really be considered a business expense? It can be tricky to apply it to HMRC’s rule of being needed for business, but you can under certain circumstances.
For example you are allowed to claim back a meal when it is considered a travel expense. This means that it needs to be outside of your normal working routine and practices – IE not where you normally work. So if you have to travel to a meeting or stay away from home for a night for business then your food and drink while you are doing this can be claimed.
That said, it can depend on whether you’re considered a sole trader or not and that is when things can often become much more complicated. When you have been doing this for a number of years it can become more simple and easy to set up.
Rather than let yourself get stressed with the details of trying to arrange all of this it is far better to get someone board that knows what they are doing and can take care of all of this for you.
