Guernsey self-employed allowed to make £50k profit before repaying payroll co-funding
Guernsey's Policy & Resources Committee have partially backtracked on a clause designed to take back taxpayers' money from businesses who claim payroll co-funding support but eventually turn a profit this year.
During Monday's Covid media briefing, the Chief Minister and President of P&R, Deputy Peter Ferbrache urged businesses to think very carefully about whether they needed to make a claim.
He also said businesses who ended up bouncing back well from this lockdown would be told to pay some of the money back from their profits.
On Friday, the Policy and Resources Committee issued a statement clarifying that the self-employed and sole traders will only have to pay back some co-funding support if they turn a profit of more than £50,000.
The P&R Committee said profits up to that amount would be considered personal income, as many sole traders and self-employed people do not pay themselves a regular salary.
The States also confirmed that any support that is to be recovered will be done so following the submission of the tax return for 2021. Therefore, any repayment would not be requested until 2022 at the earliest.
Time to pay and staged payment arrangements would be agreed to spread any cost.
Any payroll co-funding support received in 2020 will not be subject to the clause, and charities and not-for-profits are exempt.
Eligible businesses will be able to apply from the 1 February in order to claim for the period commencing 23 January.