Category: Investment

Top 5 Mistakes You Must Avoid in Your 2021 Tax Planning

plan your taxAny person’s financial objective should include tax planning. Tax planning begins when an individual starts to work and lasts almost the rest of one’s life, even after retirement.

Paying taxes is an important part of contributing to the nation’s growth, but when the government offers you the opportunity to save money on taxes, you should take advantage of it.

We’ve noticed that people often fail to look at tax planning critically and begin making tax-saving investments in a very technical manner.

Tax planning is an important aspect of our financial planning process, and careful planning will go a long way toward achieving our financial objectives. In this blog post, we’ll go through Five common mistakes to avoid when it comes to tax planning.

1. Paying taxes when not needed

A Personal Savings Allowance of £1,000 is available to all basic rate taxpayers. This ensures that the initial £1,000 of the interest from an individual’s joint savings interest is tax-free. The PSA for higher rate band taxpayers is £500 (nil for additional rate taxpayers).

Unlike in the past, building societies as well as banks will no longer deduct tax at the source (unless or until R85is signed). If an in dividual exceeds their PSA, he/she will be required to pay taxes to HMRC directly.

2. Not performing as a group

Married couples/civil partners can save money on taxes by gifting some kind of investments to their spouse whosoever pays the minimum or lower tax rate – but it must be a true gift, not just a symbolic gesture.

If you’re married or in a civil partnership and you were born on or before April 6, 1935, you might be eligible for Married Couple’s Allowance, which will help you save money on your taxes.

If you were both born after April 6, 1935, you canbe eligible for theallowance but it depends totally on your earned income.

3. Refusing to demand the Blind Person’s Allowance

If you are born blind or highly sight-impaired, or if you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland and your vision is too poor to do any job that requires eyesight, you can receive an additional £2,390 allowance.

After you’ve registered with the local authority as a blind person, call HMRC and inquire for Blind Person’s Allowance. It is not applied automatically.

4. Not paying attention to tax code

A tax code indicates your employer the amount of your tax-free pay; the rest is taxed. The tax authorities will notify you on a regular basis to clarify about the creation of code.

Check that you’ve been given the right kind of allowances, pensions or other type of incomes shown are accurate, and that everything you don’t understand has been clarified.

5. Not paying on time

As a taxpayer you need to complete tax-filing for the current year so, you must complete it by October 31st, or by January 31st if you complete it electronically. Each tax year, the tax should be payable by the 31st of January.

If an individual miss or exceeds the deadline, you’ll be hit with a £100 penalty right away, with higher fines coming in another three months.

Key advantages of tax planning

Tax planning techniques are often used to assist a company in achieving its financial and business objectives. Tax planning has advantages for both large and small companies, and it plays a significant role in:

• The smooth running of the financial planning process is facilitated by tax planning.

• Collection of taxes on time decreases legal wrangling.

• Tax planning allows taxable profits to be channelled into a variety of investment plans.

• Taking advantage of all available tax reliefs, grants and credits

• You will save money by managing your taxes.

• Corporate tax planning allows them to contribute to our country’s economic development.

• Helps to maintain economic stability

Winding up

Nowadays, taxes for companies, firms, and the self-employed individuals are a little more difficult because they can’t be deducted on a pay-as-you-earn basis like they are for employees. This is where a tax accountant’s services become extremely valuable.

A tax accountant who is professionally licenced and trained will assist you in organising your financial statements and calculating your tax bill so that you always pay the correct amount of tax.

Tax advisors will also assist you in developing and implementing a tax policy that will help you avoid paying excessive taxes in the future.

You shouldn’t underestimate the value of having a tax accountant on your side, whether you run a big organization or are a self-employed sole trader.

Sophia is a full-time financial writer at experlu. she is a passionate blogger and love to share her knowledge on various subject. Content created by Experlu– are loved, shared & can be found all over the internet on high authority platforms.

Helpful Resources to Learn about Options Trading

understanding forexForex trading is becoming more popular gradually, but as a beginner, we become overwhelmed without finding any authentic resources to learn from. Sometimes we find a source, we do not understand where to start. To solve this dilemma, strategic planning is effective and may work as a guideline to learning about Forex trading.

You won’t understand the market if you do not have a plan beforehand. The internet is a huge place, and there is no lack of resources. But problems arise when we cannot decide on things and make a plan for our Forex education. Here, we will discuss popular ways to learn about the Forex market.

List of resources:

1. Google search

In the beginning, newbies have to research well by surfing the web. A beginner can take a notepad and copy web links of different resources, which he thinks maybe helpful later. After making a list of hundreds of articles, he should give himself a break. Then, he has to start analyzing the links and reading their contents. After looking at all those links, he will have a better idea about the basics of FX trading and be prepared to take on a new challenge.

2. Webinars

Nowadays, webinars have become very popular, and beginners can enhance their knowledge about FX by attending these webinars. Using webinars, one can know about the market trends and new strategies, which are really essential to execute trades. Market leaders also get presented here as the hosts and advice about the necessary steps to be successful with the trends. Along with that, you can also take advantage of the premium articles published by high-end brokers. View this page of Saxo and read more articles to improve your skills.

Amateurs should be careful before investing their money on the webinars as fraudulent activities may be seen here too. Studies show that many of beginners lose their money by buying fake webinar tickets which do not have any value in the end.

3. Mentors

Taking the advice of the professionals in the United Kingdom really proves as a great way to gain practical skills in options trading. Mentors are conducting their trading year on year, which has provided them with an unbeatable experience. They support newbies and help them to gather knowledge about the Forex market with their live training session.

Without a professional guide, no one becomes able to know the possible pitfalls regarding this platform. To make things easier, beginners may take the help of the mentors and increase their profit by getting the live support. It is very common for beginners face many problems in real-world trading. In this case, mentors can really help them to keep on track in and achieve success fairly quickly.

4. Relatives and friends

You may find out if anyone in your family or friendship groups work in the trading business or not. Generally, this type of thing is not known about, and if we do not ask them, we will not get the truth. If we find that someone is already engaged in FX, we can ask them to help us. Asking someone’s help does not bring our reputation down; rather, it helps you to be more advanced than other beginners in the market. We may get practical skills from them and learn the ins and outs of the market, which no one else could tell us.

5. Online courses

There are so many popular courses online that can help people who are interested in Forex. Newbies can attend these courses and try to become professional gradually. One thing a beginner can do is to enroll in a paid course and open a demo FX account. They can apply the lessons they have learnt in the demo account, which may provide them with some practical skills.

These are all the easiest ways that can help you educate yourself about FX trading at the beginning of your career. Besides this, newbies should follow the market leaders on social media to say up to date with changes in the market.

COVID-19: Money-saving tips during coronavirus pandemic

save your moneyIt is guaranteed corona has affected your life in so many ways – your job, your social relationships, your shopping habits, your psychological state… none of those remained unchanged and you had to adjust them to the pandemic. In the end, you ask yourself ”Will it EVER end?”.

Spending more money and buying more products than you need may get you thinking ”How can I save some money?”. Here are some money-saving tips that will hopefully help you increase the amount in your wallet.

Track your money!

Start a budget – there are some very useful apps that can do the job for you. The thing is, everybody is stressed about the financial aspects of this period of life.

So, make yourself safe! Start an emergency fund that will prepare you for the unexpected events, for example, some medical injuries or job loss.

Open a saving account – that way your money will be physically far away from you! Use all the help you might need when dealing with Bank Accounts.

Being stressed or bored is a fertile ground for maximizing your retail expenses. So, in the future always have some plans (watch a movie, cook a meal,…) to decrease your boredom and release the stress.

Give up things that you don’t use!

We all have some material things we are very attached to, but you have to be reasonable.

Try to list the things you don’t use, such as streaming TV subscriptions, or you might not be able to use at this time, such as gym membership.

Giving up some things might help you save some money.

Be aware of the small things!

Trifles such as turning your light off when you leave the room or unplugging your charger when you are not using it can make a small but needed difference.

Become aware of the things you do on your phone – avoid commercials and sponsorships that can easily arouse your desire to spend some money on the fun stuff.

Think ahead!

For example, prepare your meal plan. Think about what you want to eat for an upcoming couple of days.

That way you can save in two ways: first, you will know exactly what to buy with no ”I might need this tonight” while walking through the store. And second, by preparing a meal at home, you can stop yourself from going to restaurants on your lunch break or for dinner.

Thinking ahead may be a crucial factor for your money savings!
If you want to take it to the next level, now is the time – grow your own food! Parsley, chives and mint are a good start.

Use what can be used!

Your market in which you go to almost every day has a coupon system or digital coupons system for sure – download their apps or start collecting them.

Use your rights as a customer. In no time you could save some big amounts of money!

Be ready to compromise!

Although your hair might not look as perfect as you wish, or your nails might not be polished with that perfect shade, it will still be pretty!

Cancel your beauty appointments and have some fun with homemade beauty.

Regardless of the issue you may be facing, Optimal Solicitors’ Manchester Office will jump to the rescue with their no win no fee policy!

Should You Invest In Money Back Plans or Endowment Policies?

get your moneyChoosing a life insurance plan is always a difficult task as there are a plethora of insurance products available. Apart from various other life insurance products, two traditional life insurance plans in which many of us get confused is money back plan and endowment plan. People could not find out whether they should go for the best endowment policy or opt for a money back plan. Well to overcome this confusion we are here discussing the basic difference between these two plans:

Money Back Plan and Endowment Plan – An Overview

Both money back and endowment plans are there in the market for quite a long time, but people are not sure which to select as most of them could not find out the basic difference between the two.

Even though both the plans are life insurance cum savings plans, but there is a slight difference between both of these. This slight difference lies in their survival benefits. The survival benefit that endowment plan pays upon maturity of the policy includes the sum assured as well as a bonus. On the other hand, the money back policy pays out the survival benefit usually as a fixed percentage of the sum assured at regular time intervals during the tenure of the policy. However, in case of money back policy the remaining sum assured with bonuses are paid to the insured upon maturity of the policy. In case of demise of the policyholder, both money back and endowment plans pay the sum assured to the nominee of the policy.

In this way, both these plans are savings plans, but the money back plans are there to fulfill the short term goals of the policyholder as they payout at regular intervals.While endowment plans provide a huge sum assured upon maturity of the policy.

Let us look at the fundamental difference between these two through the following table:

Factor to Consider Money Back Plans Endowment Plans
Benefits The insured gets a % of sum assured at a specific time interval and the remaining sum assured is given with bonuses at the maturity of the policy if the insured survives the plan term. The specified sum assured as well as all the applicable bonuses are given at the time of policy’s maturity if the policyholder survives the policy term.
Death Benefit Both the plans pay the sum assured as well as applicable bonuses on the death of the policyholder if he/she dies during the policy term.

Basically, money back plan pays out regular income after a regular interval and most of the times it is 5 years. Generally, for a policy of 20 years, the survival benefit that a policyholder gets becomes 120% of the total sum assured.

Policy Year’s End Survival Benefit As % of Basic Sum Assured of the Plan
5 years 20%
10 years 20%
15 years 20%
20 years 60% + Vested Bonus
Total Benefit = 120%

Which policy is better?

If the aim a person behind purchasing a policy is to fulfill his/her short term goals and get some money after a regular interval, the money back plans are best for them. There are much money back plans available online and one can purchase the best money back policy according to his/her requirements.

However, if one’s aim of the investment is to accumulate large corpus and get it at the time of maturity of the policy, then selecting an endowment plan is recommended. In this way, it is entirely choice of a policyholder to decide which plan is best suited for him/her. There are many endowment plans also available and to select the best one must know his/her requirements first.

One should always remember that it is the personal expectation and requirements of an individual that should be kept in mind before selecting a plan as investment and life cover.

Summing It Up!

Before selecting any of the plans out of these two policies, it is suggested to check an individual’s objective of investment and his/her expectations from it. One way to do this is to compare different policies on the bases of its inclusions, benefits, and rider benefits provided in it. See an individual’s expectation with that plan. If both match then finalizing that plan can be taken into consideration. One can compare different policies of money back plans and endowment plan online with the help of a good insurance web aggregator. Last but not least, both these plans are good investment plans and it is just the requirement of an individual from the policy. So, do not hesitate, just understand the inclusions of your plan and enjoy the benefits.

Avoiding the ATM Pitfalls: 7 Credit Card Tips for Traveling Abroad

card using tipsHere are some pointers on how to use your credit card wisely abroad and suggestions for using a travel card plus other savvy tips that should ensure you get the benefits of using your plastic on foreign soil without costing more than it should.

Before you go

It should be remembered that some credit cards are more attractive than others when it comes to overseas use and it would be a smart move to check out which of the cards in your wallet are international-friendly.

Using your credit card abroad will often incur a transaction fee and a withdrawal fee at the ATM, but you will find that some card companies either don’t charge any extra fees or offer much lower transaction charges than some of their rivals.

Shop around and check to see which is the best card to have with you abroad.

ATM agony

Drawing cash out of an ATM is quick and easy but it can be one of the most expensive ways of using your credit card, especially abroad.

The card company will likely charge you a cash advance fee and interest on the amount you take out and there may well be a foreign transaction fee on top of that too.

Try to plan your trip so that you don’t have to use an ATM unless your card provider is one that doesn’t apply punitive charges and interest.

Keep it local

Another potential sting in the tail is when the merchant offers to convert the transaction into your local currency rather than theirs.

This is invariably a bad idea as the conversion rate is not normally as good as the “mid-market rate” that card providers use when they make the conversion on your statement.

Tell your credit card company

Having chosen the card or cards that you are going to use abroad it makes good sense to tell them of your travel plans in advance.

If your card starts being used abroad and you haven’t told them beforehand they might assume that the transactions are fraudulent, which could mean they decline a purchase or block the card altogether.

Save the hassle by notifying the card provider so that they won’t flag foreign purchases as suspicious.

A bit of peace of mind

It is worth pointing out that there are definite benefits to using a credit card abroad too, and one of those plus points is the fact that you should get payment protection.

If you buy something that is faulty and it is not feasible to get a refund from the retailer your card company should offer payment protection and cover any potential loss you might otherwise have suffered if you paid for something in cash.

Find a secure connection

If you are using a banking app or accessing your account over the internet while abroad make sure that you find a secure connection rather than rely on somewhere more vulnerable like an Internet cafe.

You don’t want to find that your personal details have been compromised.

Lost or stolen

If your credit card is lost or stolen don’t waste any time telling your credit card company.

Any delay could give someone the chance to wreak havoc with your card if it’s fallen into the wrong hands.

Even though it might be a pain to interrupt your holiday to call your bank it could save a lot more hassle later on.

Avoid the classic credit card pitfalls and if you choose your card provider wisely it should make using it abroad a breeze.