MJB Partnership

• Pension Tax relief is unchanged following this budget.
• The Pension Annual Allowance is unaffected and will remain at £40,000.
• The main ISA and Lifetime ISA allowances are unaffected, however the Junior ISA allowance will increase from £4,260 to £4,368 in April 2019.
• Personal tax allowance threshold to be increased from £11,850 to £12,500 from April 2019 with an increase from £46,350 to £50,000 for the higher rate tax threshold.
• Capital Gains Tax annual exemption is to increase from £11,700 to £12,000 in April 2019.
• The ‘end of austerity‘ – The forecast for UK growth has been downgraded to 1.3% in 2018 and raised to 1.6% in 2019.
• Fuel duty and Beer duty will be frozen, however, the cost of cigarettes and wine will increase.
• £500 million extra funds will be put towards Brexit, with the possibility of a full Budget next Spring.
• The NHS will receive £20 billion extra funding over the next five years, with £2 billion allocated to mental health.
• Business rates relief for small businesses to the sum of £900 million.
• Schools to receive extra £400 million to buy “the little extras they need”.

This edition begins with focusing on the Bank of England’s interest rate rise in August 2018. It also considers possibly contents of the Budget and changes to ISAs…

CLIENT NEWSLETTER – Autumn 2018

This edition highlights current issues affecting client’s investments and tax changes that we feel may be relevant to you…

CLIENT NEWSLETTER – MAY 2018

In advance of the new General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) coming into force on the 25th May 2018, we have now uploaded our Privacy Policy to our website.

You can find it in the Document Library under our About Us tab.

Read details of the individual tax rates for the year 2018/19.

(more…)

We are hoping to publish regular Client Newsletters on our website from now on…
Here is the first one, which focuses on some areas of financial planning that clients may need to consider towards the end of the financial year.
CLIENT NEWSLETTER – FEBRUARY 2018

For once pension legislation was not changed in the Chancellor’s recent Budget and we think it is good news that tax relief and annual allowances have not been altered. The Budget was relatively quiet with regard to Financial Services and the main beneficiaries will be ‘first time buyers’ who can save on Stamp Duty.

Now that the Conservatives are back in Government it has recently been confirmed that the Money Purchase Annual Allowance will be reduced to £4,000. This applies to the current financial year.

In addition, the Dividend Tax allowance will be reduced to £2,000 per annum from 6 April 2018.

The changes to Probate Fees have not yet been brought forward.

We will keep you informed.

Due to parliament being dissolved on 3rd May there was insufficient time for the entire finance bill to be passed. The following proposed changes will therefore, not be going ahead in the timescales previously planned:-

• The fee payable with an application for probate was set to increase, in some cases considerably, from 1st May 2017.
• Money purchase annual allowance for pension contributions was due to be decreased from £10,000 to £4,000 for those in drawdown.
• The individual tax free allowance for Dividend income was set to be reduced from £5,000 to £2,000 pa, in April 2018.

If you are an existing client you are no doubt aware that you have the option to log-in and view the plans you hold with MJB via Web Portal on the ‘Client Log-in’ page of our website.

We have emailed all clients currently using this facility to inform you that for your added security this log-in page is changing to Wealth Platform.  It is located in the same place on our website menu.

The image we showed on the email was of a bridge with a sunset, however, this may appear as a blue sky with white clouds depending on the image you choose in the bottom left hand corner.  Don’t be alarmed..it’s the log-in box in the centre which is important.  We apologise in advance if for any reason you failed to receive the email notification.

You may be required to go though a new registration process, but please try your existing log-in details first to see whether they are functioning, before you re-register.  To improve security you may be required to include, not only an email address, but also a mobile number at some point during the registration process.  This is so that a set-up security code can be texted to you.

Please be assured that this is is purely an administration change and will have absolutely no impact on your holdings.

I trust that you will appreciate how important it is to have sensitive information kept secure and I hope the changeover will not cause you too much inconvenience.

If you wish to view your joint or your partner’s holdings please click on the bobble icon in the top right hand corner of your Wealth Platform page (it has a picture of a person). Click the drop-down arrow and choose ‘My Preferences’, tick ‘Include Joint’ and/or ‘Include Partner’ and ‘Save’.  You only have to do this once, however, if you and your partner log-in independently and you both wish to see each other’s holdings, you will both need to tick these boxes and save.  

IF YOU DO NOT WISH YOUR PARTNER TO BE ABLE TO VIEW YOUR PLANS YOU NEED TO CONTACT US SO WE CAN TURN OFF THIS OPTION.

If you do have any problems with accessing this, please either phone the office on 01243 771777 or email your designated Adviser on the relevant email address below…

bryan@mjbpartnership.co.uk  mark@mjbpartnership.co.uk james@mjbpartnership.co.uk  trevor@mjbpartnership.co.uk