Category: Accounting

Expect to pay somewhere between £50 and £150 a month if you are a sole trader, and £200 to £400 a month if you run a limited company, with a standalone Self Assessment usually costing £150 to £600. The band you land in depends on your trading structure, how many transactions you generate, how tidy your records are, and how unusual your income is. Creative businesses generally sit near the top of their band, because project income, royalties and grant conditions add work to the same annual cycle.

A profit and loss statement (P&L, or income statement) shows whether a business made a profit or a loss over a chosen period, by setting revenue against cost of goods sold and operating expenses to arrive at net profit. UK limited companies must file one with Companies House as part of their annual accounts; sole traders don’t file one separately but need the same figures for Self Assessment.

For sole traders or freelancers paying themselves outside PAYE, an SA302 certificate is the only way mortgage lenders will verify income, and you can use

Good bookkeeping for creatives starts with one habit: recording income and expenses as they happen, not in a January panic. Disorganised records cost you both

Cash accounting lets you pay VAT only once your invoice is settled. Accrual accounting charges it when the invoice is raised. Only businesses with taxable

Distributable reserves are what legally determine if a limited company can pay a dividend. A company can report a healthy net profit for the year

An emergency tax code is applied when HMRC doesn’t have your full income details: it means you’re probably overpaying tax right now, and you can

Management accounts give you a real-time view of profit, cash flow, and financial position: usually prepared monthly or quarterly, they replace year-end guesswork with decisions

An accrual records income or expenses when the work happens, not when cash moves. Your accounts show what you’ve actually earned and owed, not just

Note: We aim to give the best, honest recommendations to people in the creative industries.In this blog post, we take a look at the best