Why Media Specialists Should Protect Themselves from Tax Investigations


There have been some recent changes in the way that HMRC are approaching small and medium businesses to ensure that their record keeping is being managed correctly – the launch of business record checks, and the threat of subsequent tax investigations, are now making it absolutely essential to ensure that you know exactly what you're doing with your self assessments and tax returns.

If you work in the creative arts industry, such as in TV or the media, it can be difficult to know exactly what you can claim as a legitimate business expense, and therefore what items you can claim tax relief for. Of course, anybody can find it difficult to do their accounts themselves, but with the creative arts sector so full of freelancers who are constantly running around trying to secure contracts for the next job, it's particularly common for these professionals to struggle to maintain and manage their financial records. This brings about potential problems; if you’re one of the chosen businesses who will be given these record checks, you could face full tax investigations if the inspector feels that you’ve been getting things wrong for a long time.

You Can’t Do Everything Yourself

With all the best intentions in the world, there’s every chance that an inspector will find mistakes within your accounts. Sometimes this is purely down to a misunderstanding of claimable expenses, but it can also be down to the fact that working as a media specialist is poles apart from accountancy!  Take, for example, a TV cameraman; while they may be mediaspecialists, there is nothing in their job remit that would give them any understanding or knowledge of accountancy - and while they're busy working, they simply don't have the time to study accountancy at an in-depth enough level to secure the knowledge that they need.

Find an Accountant Who Works with MediaSpecialists

This is where tax investigations can become a problem; how do media specialists know what's right and wrong when it comes to their record keeping? Well the answer is that they can't know without getting help, and if they carry on blindly doing their own accounts then any taxinvestigations could spell trouble. If during these tax investigations you're found to have been keeping bad and incomplete records, not only will you have to pay any tax that hasn't been calculated properly, but you may also face a steep fine. So if you're in the creative arts and you're responsible for your own accounts, it might be time to employ an accountant who works with mediaspecialists, who can complete your monthly records and take care of your tax return at the end of the financial year.

Business record checks and tax investigations aren’t anything to worry about per se, but if you work in an industry where you’re more focused on the creative than the administrative side of things, it can be a real challenge to understand legislation and tax rules in order to keep things in order. So for media specialists who have just been shoving their receipts and invoices into a box, with the intentions of sorting it out later, it’s probably time to approach an accountancy company who work with media specialists and can offer a structured accountancy package. This can save you a lot of worry if you’re chosen for business record checks – and then if you do become the subject of HMRC’s tax investigations, you’ll have the peace of mind that you’ve had professional help to keep you in line with their guidance.