Someone posted a query on the Forum this week about disaggregation, ie the artificial separation of businesses to avoid VAT. And it made me think of how we run our lives and how we try to keep business and non-business affairs separate and whether this is the right thing to do.
Recently, my techie friend reminded me that this is a “VATBlog” so I should remember to blog about VAT issues at least some of the time. And my financial counsellor from the local Chamber of Commerce mentioned that he didn’t think it was appropriate for a professional advisor who is MD of her own company to talk about Star Trek on her business website blog.
And they are probably both right. If I want to do blogging about personal stuff, I should probably go onto Facebook and blog about my raspberry plants and the latest Star Trek movie there.
But says who? Is there a rule written down somewhere that you have to disaggregate your business and personal life?
During this past year, various advisors have insisted that I should keep my business and non-business affairs separate. And I agree that there are very good reasons for this. Tax and accounting is the obvious practical reason, as well as the need to demonstrate one’s professionalism and ability to focus.
I always found this very easy to do when I was an employee. Generally speaking, once I was home from the office I put work out of my mind until the next morning.
But being self-employed is quite different. Here’s a simple example. My telephone bill. I work from home a lot of the time and have a single telephone line with two numbers, one for business and one for non-business use. The account is in my name, not the company’s. I most certainly use the phone much more for business than for non-business purposes but always have a landline for my personal use. I use the internet for both business and non-business use and it would be absolutely impossible to differentiate how I use my time when on line.
I know that is a very practical example but for me, it applies to everything in life. If I get a new client, then I’m much happier in my personal time because I’m not worrying about work so much. Conversely if our communal satellite aerial breaks down (which it has, for the past two Easter weekends in a row), I’m really grouchy when working because I haven’t been able to blob in front of my favourite sci fi shows. Anyone with a poorly child knows how difficult it is to concentrate on work when you’re worrying about them. The simple point is that for me, keeping business and private affairs in separate boxes in the brain and keeping the lid on one while accessing the contents of the other is very artificial!
Men focus, Women Multi-task
I think this is driven by our hormones. We all know about women being good at multi-tasking – which we are, I’ve written my shopping list and watched the news while writing this blog. If I had children, I’d probably have read a bedtime story and done the packed lunches for tomorrow as well. My last partner, by comparison, was unable to stick a load of dirty washing in the machine while working on management account spreadsheets as he was “concentrating”.
I don’t say this to criticize men – the drive to “focus” is the reason that many of the great minds of history have been men. In my experience, men are more likely to excel at a single skill set while women are more likely to be good all-rounders. We need both in the world.
This doubtless explains why I find it very difficult to run my life with a defined business/non-business focus. I’ve stood up in front of 100 people giving a lecture about VAT and had half of my mind flitting between what to cook for tea and the fact that my new shoes are far too high, though they look good!
But I know that it’s important to be able to focus when necessary and sometimes I really enjoy having nothing to do other than work on one specific project – it feels like a luxury to have that focus. And on the other hand it’s also important to be able to switch off from work to rest and relax properly.
Anyway, next week I will be blogging about VAT and most likely, partial exemption as I’m becoming more and more frustrated about the problems inherent in using the standard method. The standard method is supposed to be the easy way of doing partial exemption (if partial exemption is ever easy) and I’ll be having a good old moan about how difficult it all is in practise.
Happy Birthday Dad!
And finally, this week would have been my Dad’s 93rd birthday were he alive. I miss him every single day but know that I was lucky to be his daughter. The love he gave us in life is always a source of strength and comfort and we were so lucky to have him. I hope that someone up in heaven made him a nice roast dinner and given him control of the TV remote so that he can watch teh cricket all day long!
So my apologies for another week where my VATBlog isn’t about VAT and I hope you all manage to put the lid on your own business affairs and relax over the weekend!
Marie