Invoice to my personal name, instead of Ltd company. Any disadvantage?

[braddo]

For reasons I'd rather not go into now, I'd prefer for a supplier in China to make an invoice out to me personally. Don't want them to know my company name.

If I buy goods and the invoice is made out to my personal name, can I still claim them as a business expense for tax purposes? What about the VAT on supplies? Any effect?

Some clarification from an accountant would be brilliant!

cheers!

Brad

 

[Cheapest Printing]

I am not an accountant myself, but I am pretty sure that you are able to use the invoices for yourself in the company accounts too

Matt

 

[braddo]

Any other feedback on this? Would be much appreciated if an accountant can give their view.

cheers!

 

[PerfectP]

We had a similar issue - an invoice was made out to a personal name rather than the business, nothing untoward - just someone had put the wrong details (individual name rather than company name).
After a phone call to my accountant, he said it's not a problem, try and get the invoice changed if not - then we could take it (the invoice amount) out of the company as a legitimate expense. As it happens, we did get the invoice name changed by the supplying company.

 

[GGGSurrey]

What about the VAT on supplies? Any effect?

I understand that if there was VAT on an Invoice of more than £250, you could only reclaim the VAT with a valid VAT Invoice. This requires the name and address on it of the person or company reclaiming the VAT.

 

[braddo]

The reason I don't want my Chinese supplier to know my company name, is that I don't want them to be able to google my company, suss out the industry and then target my competitors.

So from what people have said in this thread - I gather that it's ok to claim a goods invoice as a business expense - even if it's made out to my personal name?

However to claim VAT, then I need it made out to my VAT registered company?

Ok - I understand all that. However the Chinese supplier won't be adding any VAT on the invoice. The VAT will be charged and paid only once the items come into the UK.

Does this mean that I can rely on the HMRC customs invoice for VAT refund?

And that I can also rely on the "My Name" invoice to justify claiming the expense as a business "Cost of goods"?

 

[paulears]

As I understand it, you will be invoiced the VAT and other duty from DHL or whoever are handling the packages - so if you can get them to re-invoice to your company, you can reclaim it - but you probably won't know which handler is being used until it actually arrives.

 

[braddo]

This transaction hasn't occured yet.

I will be using my own freight forwarding company for the shipment - and THEY will definitely be invoicing to my Company name.

I don't want to have to get anyone to reinvoice anything.

Essentially, I simply need to know what the implications are, if I was to have the supplier invoice made out to my personal name.

 

[braddo]

Any accountant able to advise me? Please.

 

[Jenni384]

If you personally incur a cost on behalf of the company, you can charge it to the company via an expense claim.

 

[braddo]

Thanks Jenni. Does this apply to any expense? even the actual wholesale purchase of the products that my company sells?

 

[paulears]

The usual factor in deciding if a transaction is valid is simply determining if it's a genuine business transaction. In this case, you've bought stock. Presumably the audit trail will show company money was used, so there's no problem. The other advice above justifies this anyway - so there's nothing to stop you selling something you bought to the company anyway - so as long as the transaction is clean and transparent, there's nothing really that could be seen as weird.

 

[braddo]

Yep - I realise nothing stops me selling something to my company. Although I don't want to have to pay VAT on the goods again.

Expense claim sounds like the way to go.

Thanks all!

 

[Jenni384]

Technically you can buy everything personally and expense claim it. I can't think of any good reason why anyone would. The time and hassle of the paperwork makes it an undesirable option. You can't avoid any taxes by doing it that way.

 

[braddo]

Hi Jenni,

Thanks for your help and advice.

As explained earlier; my reason for doing this is not tax related. I want to do it, so that my Chinese product supplier doesn't know my company name and cannot google my company. They produce one part of my product offering - and have no knowledge of exactly how that part fits in with the rest of the product offering. If they knew this, then they could potentially target my competitors and damage my business.