Earners categorised by regulation

By Tolley in association with Jim Yuill at The Yuill Consultancy

The following Employment Tax guidance note by Tolley in association with Jim Yuill at The Yuill Consultancy provides comprehensive and up to date tax information covering:

Earners categorised by regulation
Background
Employments to be disregarded
Employments treated as employed earners employment
Employment treated as self-employment
Provisions to identify secondary Class 1 contributors in particular cases

Background

When applying the usual status tests to individuals, the tax and NIC position will generally be the same. However, there are certain individuals who, because of social security benefit entitlement purposes or administrative convenience, are treated differently.

SSCBA 1992, ss 2(2), 7(2) allow that regulations may provide for:

•employment and the earnings from that employment to be disregarded for contribution liability purposes
•a person in any prescribed employment to be treated as falling within a category of earner other than that in which he would otherwise fall
•the secondary contributor to be specifically defined

In simple terms this means that certain employments will be disregarded altogether, some individuals who would be self-employed for tax purposes under the usual rules (see the Employment status tests guidance note) would be treated as employed earners and in the same way that some employed earners would be treated as self-employed. The detail is found in the Social Security (Categorisation of Earners) Regulations 1978, SI 1978/1689.

Employments to be disregarded

The following types of employment are disregarded:

•employment by close relatives provided that the employment is in a private dwelling house in which both the employee and employer reside and it is not employment for the purposes of any trade or business carried on there by the employer. The legislation list