Good morning everyone.

Showers are forecast for today - although there are patches of blue sky atm.

Good luck at the dentist, El.

I have some housework to do and I have to go to the shops, will be back later.

Good morning everyone, broken cloud here and I think the forecast is dry for a few days which makes a pleasant change.

 

Hope all goes well at the dentist EL and that its painless.

As I thought I need a filling and will have to go back for this and a scale & polish in a couple of weeks,

 

I received a new credit card the other day so needed to get rid of the old one. I have a powerful shredder which can shred credit cards. But for some reason, it decided that it wouldn't shred this one. It got stuck and it was quite difficult getting it out but I did and then resorted to the normal way of cutting it up into bits.

Good afternoon Sunny and mild here :confusion: and there was a tremendous sunrise as I drove in to work this morning El I hope your tooth isn't painful, I frequently used to need a filling after Christmas I expected a quiet morning but was very wrong, it's nice to have a moment now Yogi I've been chatting to a client this morning who has a border terrier who he successfully bred from, and intends to do so again. I may keep him in mind as a plan b if stream doesn't have my puppy she's due to come into season any time now, I'm sending fertile thoughts her way

Summer, it only hurts if I'm eating using the left side of my mouth, and then not always. If I drink something cold I don't notice any pain so the dentist reckons that the decay is below the surface which is why it will take longer than a quick filling.

 

Talking of dogs, there's a campaign to get Uggie nominated for an Oscar for his/her role in The Artist. Uggie was interviewed about this on the BBC news at lunchtime so if you didn't see that it may get shown in the later news programmes.

 

Here's an all too brief clip from the film.

Lol el that clip was thoroughly enjoyable! I wish we had a cinema in here, I'd watch that movie right now!

That clip was great EL, I am so taken aback at this being a modern movie though, I still can't get my head around it.  I hope your tooth behaves itself until you can get back for your next appointment, aren't teeth a blessed nuisance?

Squiggle, we could set up a teeth support group

 

Although The Artist is now on release it doesn't look as if it will come anywhere near you or me though. Its showing in 18 cinemas around the country this week. The chances are we will have to wait for it to be out on DVD. Amazon do have it on their site as to be released in the future.

 

Of course if it gets the top Oscar this year it may well get re-released on a wider basis.

 

El, that clip was great, I want to watch the whole film now.

Squiggle, sign me up for the teeth support group. I've also been known to need a filling repaired following Christmas - usually courtesy of Thornton's delicious toffee.

Summer, I think it's a good idea to have a plan B, but I'll still keep my fingers crossed that Stream gets pregnant when she comes in season this time.

 

I had a bit of a disaster in the kitchen this afternoon. I walked in to find the floor flooded. The problem seemed to be the u-bend under the sink, I think it needs tightening, sealed or something (I'm not very technical, can you tell). Anyway, youngest son will fix it when he comes in, I hope.

Yogi, I hope your son can sort out the u-bend when he gets in. Flooded kitchens is the sort of thing you can do without.

 

I don't know what Call the Midwife will be like. New programme starting at 8 on BBC1 on Sunday. Its about a group of midwives (obviously ) in East London in the 1950s. A newly qualified midwife arrives at what she thinks is a hospital only to find that it's a convent.

 

Regular members of the cast includes Pam Ferris, Judy Parfitt, Miranda Hart , Cliff Parisi (Minty from Eastenders) and most interestingly Jenny Agutter (I've always liked her and we are of a similar age). The new midwife is called Jenny and is played by Jessica Raine. The older Jenny is voiced by Vanessa Redgrave.

 

Hi x
Hope you get your leak sorted Yogi, that sounds rude ! 
Great clip El, what a lovely doggy , i hope the Oscar comes his/her way  

Loathe the dentist, as you know. Forgot my son is 18 soon and meant to have him checked out before he has to pay !! 

Call the Midwife reminds of another programme that was on a while back, cant remember what is was tho  It wasnt midwives, district nurses in Yorkshire......anyway may have a look at that El 

Dilemma! I fancy the midwives programme but I cannot bear Miranda Hart, if she is playing a character will she be less irritating I wonder?

Not keen on her either squiggle, strange mix tho with Pam Ferris, Judy Parfitt and Jenny Agutter!

I was intrigued by the trailer for Call the Midwife as I thought "surely that's Jenny Agutter - i must check that out". I've never seen Miranda so don't have any strong views on Miranda Hart either way. At 6 foot 1 she's likely to be the tallest person in the cast. And according to IMDB, when she was at school, the head girl was Clare Balding.

 

Miranda,s career seems to be putting "posh" people down and mocking "posh" folk, although she seems to be one herself. In my opinion its the old 70,s 80, Uni routine, i find a bit tiresome. She has won awards tho, which makes me   
But as we say, each to our own  

I'm off to read soon, so have a good evening everyone, and sleep well

Goodnight squiggle and all 

I'll probably watch the first episode of Call The Midwife, just to see what it's like.

Skylark, you'll be glad to know that my leak has been fixed, thanks to youngest son.

Signing out too, goodnight everyone.

for the night owls.

night squiggle skylark and yogi

oooo sounds good EL - will have a look I quite like stuff set in either the 30's 40's or 50's

oooooooooooo no -glad you got it fixed

Sweet dreams all

Good morning everyone

 

Yogi, I'm glad your son has sorted out the leak. I had visions that I would turn the news on this morning and hear that Scotland had sunk under the water

 

Skylark, I think the programme you were thinking of was "Where the Heart Is" which was on ITV from 1997 to 2006. In the first couple of series it starred Sarah Lancashire and Pam Ferris as 2 nurses in a small community. There was also a factory which made toilet rolls. It was filmed in Yorkshire.

 

If it's not that, then there is The Royal but I think it more likely to the Where the Heart is.

Good morning everyone.    It's rather cloudy here today, but quite mild.  That's good as it saves the oil.  Unfortunately it's due to turn colder by the end of the week!!

 

El Loro, I think you are right in saying the programme mentioned is "Where the Heart Is".  I will give the new midwives programme a look.

 

I'm off for my usual trip to the bank and the shops this morning.  Have a rather large tax bill to pay this month!!  Hubby took his pension early, at the beginning of last year, and only basic rate tax was taken for several months so I knew way back last summer that we were going to have to give the goverment a large chunk of cash. 

 

How are you getting on with "Here Come The Girls" Squiggle?  Have a good day everyone, whatever you are doing. 

Joyron, it always strikes me as unfortunate that the tax bill has to be paid by the end of January just at the same time as people are paying off their credit card bills for the Christmas period.

 

I have a client who has a substantial pension and also a substantial salary. The tax coding system in this country just doesn't adequately allow for this situation for higher rate taxpayers. The pension may be taxed to allow for the personal allowance and the bulk of the standard rate band. The salary tends to get taxed at either the BR (basic rate 20%) which results in far too little tax being deducted or at the D0 rate (40%) which can mean too much tax gets deducted. There's nothing in the tax coding system which allows for only part of the salary to be taxed at 20% to the extent that the basic rate band has been used up against the pension, and the rest of the salary at 40%. The first time I acted for my client was very close to the tax deadline. I rang him on his mobile to let him know what the tax position was. I realised he was driving and told him to stop driving and ring me back. When he rang, I had to tell him he had £10k tax to pay in just over a week's time. It was because all of his salary had been taxed at 20% but a large part of it should have been at 40%.

Good morning everyone, nice and dry here I hope it doesn't get too cold towards the end of the week.

 

EL OUCH! that was some tax bill I cannot imagine getting a phone call like that thank goodness.

 

Glad you got your leak fixed Yogi   Joyron I am loving the book, I don't want it to end, I am in Venice at the moment, its all lovely

Good morning dry but colder here today, and another colourful sunrise Crikey el what a tax bill! When I was self employed I used to keep 25% of everything I earned in a separate account and leave it there until my bill came in. I always had enough but I still used to get a stomach churn on opening the bill!

Summer, I wish more of my clients were as sensible as you in regularly putting money aside for the tax bill. I advise my self employed clients to do something similar but many of them don't. I also encourage them to let me do the accounts in plenty of time and I also work out what their tax bill will be for the January and July payments so that they can budget for this. Needless to say some clients don't.

El, I used to book my appointment with my accountant as soon as my year end came, and he then did my tax return right away. It was months in advance but I couldn't have rested at night if I'd have left it! I can't believe how some people just don't bother- a girl I worked with for a year didn't put a single penny aside (even though I had advised her to) and got a huge shock when her bill came in! She then resorted to trying to steal our clients do that she could earn more money. Silly girl!

Hi x
A quick hello in a bit of a rush for nursery, back later xx

Stealing clients is naughty but it does happen. Sometimes if a senior employee leaves their emplyment to set up by themselves, their employer requires them to sign an agreement saying that they won't try to pinch clients for a period of time but that's more likely in accountants and solcitors practices.

 

I've never deliberately pinched a client from another accountant but it has happened to me. The worst one was over 10 years ago. I had just finished the accounts for a husband and wife partnership. I went to see them but just the wife was there. I went through the accounts and tax with her, she signed hers, paid me my fee, and I left his return with her for him to sign and send on to me.

 

A few days later he rang me up, sacking me on the spot, and saying that he was instructing his solicitors to sue me for all the tax he had overpaid over the years This came as a bit of a shock as I was not aware that I had done anything to merit such a claim.

 

I informed my insurance claim - I am insured against claims such as this. And I waited to see what his solicitor had to say. You will be glad to know that nothing ever happened - I never heard from his solcitor or him again.

 

Anyway, I got a routine letter of enquiry from his new accountants asking for the usual information such as a copy of the last accounts and tax return. Perfectly standard and I replied as requested. I did notice though that the accountants, who were in a different town from where either I or the client lived, made no mention on their letterhead of their professional qualifications. It's normal to refer to Chartered Accountants or Certified Accountants. I tried to find out, but from what I could see, they weren't qualified accountants. At present, anyone can act as an agent dealing with people's tax returns. That is likely to change in the near future.

 

This took place in the days before self assessment for tax was introduced. The Inland Revenue issued tax calculations based on the accounts sent to them, a copy went to the client, and a copy to the agent. The new accountants sent revised accounts to the Inland Revenue but hadn't told them at that stage that I was no longer the accountant. I hadn't sent in the accounts I had done as the husband hadn't sent his return back to me.

 

As a result of them not telling the Revenue I was no longer the agent, in due course I was sent the agent copy of the tax calculation. I looked at this to see if I could work out what the new accountants had done to my figures. And I quickly realised what they had done. The profit had been reduced by an amount exactly equivalent to two personal allowances.

 

The client had two children. It was obvious that the accountants had told them that they could claim a salary equal to the personal allowance for each child. As their personal allowance covered their salary, the children would pay no tax, and the parents saved tax.

 

Apart from the children washing the cars at the weekend, they weren't involved with the business at all. People have never been able to claim salaries to their children for tax relief - there are tax cases which make this quite clear - you can't claim tax relief on what amounts to pocket money. Obviously if the children were genuinely invoved with the business that would be a different matter.

 

The new accountants were committing tax evasion which is a criminal offence, and if my client had gone to a solicitor, the solicitor would have told him that.

 

Wow, that's some posting - I better start getting my lunch.

I forgot to mention that the younger child was under 13 so wouldn't have been allowed to work in the business without a licence from the local authority. Not even a paper round.

 

Good afternoon everyone.    The sun came out for a little while but it's disappeared now.

 

Well I've been and paid the tax bill and cried all the way to the bank.  You are so right about how unfair the tax system is El Loro.  Because of the combined amount of hubby's salary and pension he gets no personal allowance, because he earns too much.  Some might say that's a nice position to be in but he works really long hours and earns his money three times over.  He didn't get home until 10.30pm last night!!

 

Fortunately I was savvy enough to realise what would happen and did hubby's self assessment tax return last July so I knew what the bill would be.  At least we didn't have to pay the tax man until this month so the money did earn a little interest for the months it was put away in savings.

 

Glad you are enjoying the book Squiggle.  I've still not had the chance to pick another one up yet, but I will as soon as time permits. 

People really try it on don't they el *shakes head* As for him sacking you, I think he treated you unfairly, I would guess he was upset about his divorce and venting by taking it out on you. Unnecessary and unpleasant, I'm glad nothing further happened Afternoon skylark

Good afternoon everyone. It's raining and blustery up here.

You'll be glad to hear that I am not responsible for any water up here, and my son has definitely sorted out the leak, El.

Hi yogi that's great news, is everything fixed & dry now?

Yes all sorted now, thank goodness, Summer.

Brilliant! It's bad enough being cold, but wet too *shakes head* I've just asked Lori to change my name- can you guess what I've requested?!

Are you going back to Sweet Summer, or will it be Sweet Spring?

Neither I will eventually go back to sweet summer though It does start with sweet..