Receipts before Sole Trader opened business

[FoleyVideos]

Hi all,

I'm starting up my own Video Editing service at the moment (and about to post off my TR1 form). When it comes to keeping all my receipts that can be marked off as expenses, I have a few questions...
Down the line, when I'm doing my first Tax return, my local Revenue office told me I can only include receipts that are dated after the date that the new business started trading. I have a lot of equipment bought in the last few months that I would consider to be Capital Expenses. Can I put these expenses down even though they occurred before my business actually opened for business?

(I know this rule is there to stop people registering a business name and not registering for self-assessment, but it seems unfair to someone like me legitimately starting up a business, but getting penalised for buying expensive equipment before I start trading. Equipment is not something that you can simply buy in a few days and have set up straight away. I have about 30 different electronic items needed.)

Any advice welcome...

 

[Joe_90]

You can only claim for expenses incurred after you commenced trading (in the main there are lots of arguments about that but they are not relevant here).

You consider the purchases to be capital so therefore you are not claiming them as expenses. They are capital and you will claim capital allowances on them.

So you should keep the invoices as part of your records.

Are you registering for VAT? VAT can only be claimed back from the date of registration.

 

[FoleyVideos]

Thanks for info Joe.

So what you're saying is, that when it comes to equipment like audio mixers and video switch cards, I can claim capital allowances on them even though I bought them in the last few months even before I got my Business name registered with the CRO?

I have all the invoices in an envelope somewhere alright.

I'm not going to register for VAT initially, as the turnover is not expected to be over the 37.5k threshold for services. Down the line, possibly in a few years time, this may be something I will do.