If you are a freelancer or contractor working in the UK, then your tax issues are likely to be a bit more complicated than people who are regularly employed. We’ve put together a guide to help you through it and sort out your tax. One major thing you need to sort out as quickly as possible is whether your business means you need to register a company or if you are self-employed and working as a sole trader as this can affect what tax you pay.

Then there’s the issue of VAT. You don’t have to worry about this too much if you’re on low to average earnings, but if you earn over £64,000 a year then you need to register for VAT. This is so you can collect and claim for Value Added Tax. It can be a complicated business as it adds an extra complication to your tax return, so if you’re worried about it you could ask an accountant to help you. It can be useful to separate the VAT when sending invoices.

One of the biggest tax issues UK freelancers have to deal with is the yearly self-assessment tax return. In order to complete this, you should keep a record of all costs associated to your work as well as all your earnings so you can input them into the form. This helps HMRC work out how much tax you owe. The tax return is based on the previous financial year (from April – April) and the tax you pay is based on your earnings in that year. One last thing to consider is how you’ll be paying your tax bill. It can be a good idea to have a cushion of money put by in case the following tax year is a bit lean and you don’t earn much as you’ll still be expected to pay the tax bill for the previous year. It can also be wise to put aside money throughout the year so that when tax time rolls around, you’ll have enough saved that you’ll be able to pay is easily.

Right now the next big job that is highly coveted is that of forensic accountants. This is one job that comes with a hefty salary, but that is just not all. This is also one of the most interesting and satisfying jobs that could be available. In case you have always had a keen sense of looking beyond the obvious then this is a line for you. The job of forensic accountants involves detecting the possible frauds that could have been resulted in corporate crimes. These days with the increase of crimes committed by big organization there is a growing need to develop a specialized class of accountants who could detect these crimes. Forensic accountants generally are handed down all the financial data and bank statements to locate whether there is any possible chance of a corporate crime in the likes of money laundering.

The first important step to this is meeting the clients and ascertaining what is being expected to be dug out. FAs are sought when there is a suspicion of a possible fraud. Forensic accountants first have to know what the exact suspicion is and the cause of the suspicions. Once the accountant has acquired the definite direction that is needed to be known, the investigator performs an initial investigation. For this stage and the remaining stages of investigation, the forensic accountant would have a right to complete documentation.

Once the FA has all the data that is needed for investigation, he or she begins the process of data mining. Data mining refers to process of hunting out the required evidence to establish a particular fraud case. Let us say that there are certain figures that appear more frequently in the entire scheme of data. That is a suspicious recurring deposit. With the help of such tools the FAs establishes trends. This process is called trending. Once trending is complete the forensic investigator generally goes over the external data. Once the external data confirms an instance of fraud, the task of a forensic investigator is complete. In fact this task is no less interesting than that of a detective. To add on the interest, you would typically be getting a good salary with amazing incentives.