Mobile hairdressing and car tax and insurance

MinnieMinx

Apologies if this is in the wrong forum.

Hi, I'm planning to work self employed as a mobile hairdresser so will be using my car to transport my equipment from home to clients house.

However, I also still want to use it for shopping and the school run. Obviously, cannot afford to run two cars!

Can I apply for commercial tax on the car and will my insurance premium skyrocket? I don't have a large client base as I recently moved so I'm trying to work out whether this is financially viable?

Appreciate any advice.

peteb2

Well you're going to need class 2 use for insurance. The rest I don't know

martinr5232

You cant get commercial tax on a car.
As for insurance say nothing whats the difference in what youre doing and driving to work.

Del2005

MinnieMinx wrote: »

Apologies if this is in the wrong forum.

Hi, I'm planning to work self employed as a mobile hairdresser so will be using my car to transport my equipment from home to clients house.

However, I also still want to use it for shopping and the school run. Obviously, cannot afford to run two cars!

Can I apply for commercial tax on the car and will my insurance premium skyrocket? I don't have a large client base as I recently moved so I'm trying to work out whether this is financially viable?

Appreciate any advice.

Very difficult to get commercial tax on a car and since you still want to use it for personal use you will be fraudulently signing the legal declaration that the commercial vehicle won't be used for private usage.

You'll need to get a commercial use policy for the car which will increase your premium.

maximum12

No a car is not a commercial vehicle regardless how it is used.

You should be looking at ways to offset some of your car costs against your income tax.

cplwhisper

martinr5232 wrote: »

You cant get commercial tax on a car.
As for insurance say nothing whats the difference in what youre doing and driving to work.

If you don't declare your "use" for the car then kiss goodbye to insurance covering your claim. Class 2 would need to be applied to a private care.

All the best

The_Honeybadger

martinr5232 wrote: »

You cant get commercial tax on a car.
As for insurance say nothing whats the difference in what youre doing and driving to work.

Bad advice. If the op is involved in an accident and the insurance company find out that she has been using the vehicle for business purposes they may not cover the claim.

There was a thread on here not long ago started by a musician who was using his private car to get around to gigs at the weekend. The insurance company found out and cancelled his policy for non disclosure, making it virtually impossible to get insured again. There is usually only a small fee for business class insurance so it's crazy to take the risk IMO.

Buffman

MinnieMinx wrote: »

Obviously, cannot afford to run two cars!

Can I apply for commercial tax on the car and will my insurance premium skyrocket? I don't have a large client base as I recently moved so I'm trying to work out whether this is financially viable?

Hi, no, you won't need to run two cars.

As others have said, you can't tax a passenger car as a commercial without converting it to a van. 'Private' tax will cover you for both private and commercial use in your car.

Regarding insurance, I'm guessing you'll be setting up a Facebook/Twitter/website for your new venture, so it'll be best to inform them.

Firstly I'd ring your current insurer for a quote to add business use to your policy, it'll be either Class 2 or Class 3. It shouldn't be that much more but only they can tell you. If it's massively more expensive, shop around with other companies and cancel with your current insurer and move.

Good luck with the new business.

MinnieMinx

Thank you for all your helpful advice. It's given me more things to consider.

My car is an older Mitsubishi Shogun (belonged to husband) and it's very expensive to tax. (€1800) I live rurally so it's handy when we get flooding on the roads into town otherwise we'd be stuck. It's got a very low mileage 60k considering it's about 11yrs old but in very good condition and totally reliable. It's also higher than a normal car which is better for my back for getting in and out and a massive boot for storing all my equipment in.

Unfortunately, due to the tax, I don't think it's worth much if I try to sell it. We had it in the U.K. and imported it when we moved. The car tax was much lower there so it wasn't something we considered. I really don't have any spare cash to buy another car if we traded it in, so it's either keep it any stump up the tax or swap for something cheaper to tax but probably less reliable. (I really hate buying cars as it's so risky.)

Some of the parents at my kids school have suggested taxing it commercially when I start working mobile because most of them do that with their 4x4 cars, although a lot of them are genuine working farmers or farmers wives and the cars are used for towing boxes and trailers.

However, they definitely use their cars for school runs etc. (Although I've even seen dads pick up kids from school in the tractor which I'm sure can't be legal but it looks fun.)

It's such a dilemma.

Gumbo

Is the car a commercial to start with?
Can it be converted to commercial or crew cab?

If so, then get the conversion done, get DOE etc and swap insurance policy onto a commercial policy using your profession.

Get insurance quote first as some insurance companies will not insure people on commercial policies unless their profession warrants it.

Also if you are registered paying vat, tax etc , you can offset some of the costs.

cplwhisper

Converted car/jeeps over to commercial for' cheap tax 'are still insured as car but with class 2 or 3 added

Born-bred commercials that left factory as same are straightforward commercial insurance