Taxes in UK for Unity developers

[I didn't found many place for this question, so I posting it here.]

I am starting to get some benefits from my assets, so I am curious how you guys dealing with taxes here in UK? I was wondering if it's difficult process, where I should go and if there are a quick answer how to pay taxes?

 

Pull a cannon up to Bucky Palace, load it with the cheap metal passing for money, holler "Bend over milady..here it comes", set the fuse to lit and plug yer ears. A Disclaimer: I am neither an attornement officer for the British Accredited Registry nor an agent of the Crown so you can either listen their BS or mine..makes no difference in the cosmic scheme of things..except I ain't trying to con you out of your sweat equity with some transactional insertionalist gambit.

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So, there are a few types of taxes you might need to care about:

a) Earning money from the asset store counts as income, so, technically you should declare this money to HMRC, probably as part of your annual tax return (due 30th Jan each year.) If the amount you earn is less than your annual tax-free amount, just smile and move on. Look at http://www.listentotaxman.com if you want to see data.

b) If you are running a company and you're VAT registered, you'll need to report the money you make selling assets as part of your VAT report. I doubt this applies to you - VAT is needed to be charged if you are registered and that happens usually around 80k GBP.

c) You will need to purchase Unity Pro if you're earning over $100k/year. Again, I think you'll know about this if you're making this kind of money. It's a Unity tax, not a UK government one.

 

What about the new rules concerning VAT effective January 2015?

http://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/taxation/vat/how_vat_works/telecom/index_en.htm

From an VAT registered Asset Store developer's perspective, is an Asset Store asset sold B2B-wise to Unity or B2C-wise to the end-user?

 

At odds with http://tamebay.com/2014/08/impact-of-new-eu-vat-rules-on-app-stores.html

 

Alex Jones, is that you?

 

Thanks Graham for answer. I am curious at the moment about a) part. I am also getting some other income: PhD scholarship and sometimes small amount of income for teaching. However, taxes for this income are arranged by my school. Do I need to account somehow these income from these sources when calculating taxes for earnings from Asset Store?

 

I think Asset Store works the same as Google Play. They do not act as seller so pretty much same things affect it. I don't have asset store seller account but maybe they have mailed about these already?

edit: BTW will we able to see sellers home/office address in 2015 when the buyer is from EU? at the moment there is mainly only email address shown but AFAIK it's mandatory to show all info in 2015

 

Typically PhD Scholarships are not taxable. It is a complex area, and I think you should seek more detailed advice, possibly from your University's student finance adviser. If they can confirm that the scholarship is not taxable, and your teaching income and asset store revenue is under 10k GBP then you do not need to worry about tax at all.

 

And have asked for someone to clarify if the Asset Store is Google-Play like or AppStore like.

 

So, Unity run the store on behalf of vendors. So we're more like an Apple than a Google. Unity will collect VAT from customers, and charge the VAT appropriate to their location. There is no change required from our vendors, at least as far as we understand the new rules.

 

I don't have asset seller account yet but a bit curious since we might sell something in next few months:

"Provider"
Any person, company or other legal entity who has accepted this Agreement by clicking and who is registered and approved by the Unity Asset Store to distribute Assets in accordance with the terms of this Agreement.

3.1

This Agreement forms a legally binding contract between Provider and Unity, in relation to Provider's use of the Unity Asset Store to distribute Assets. In order to use the Unity Asset Store to distribute Assets, Provider must first agree to this Agreement by checking the box indicating Provider’s acceptance of this Agreement prior to distributing Assets on the Unity Asset Store. Provider may not distribute Assets on the Unity Asset Store if Provider does not accept this Agreement.

4.4

Provider is solely responsible for payment of any taxes, levies and VAT or the like on any payments it receives from Unity regardless of which taxing jurisdiction that has the authority to collect such taxes, levies and VAT or the like.

4.7.1

Provider will be solely responsible for support and maintenance of Provider's Assets and any complaints about Provider's Assets. Provider's contact information will be displayed in each Asset detail page and made available to Customers for customer support purposes.​

This looks a lot like how Google Play works and they made bunch of changes cause of the stuff coming next year. Just to put this in context here is small snippet from iOS agreement.

1.1 You hereby appoint Apple and Apple Subsidiaries (collectively "Apple") as: (i) Your agent for the marketing and delivery of the Licensed Applications to end-users located in those countries listed on...​

 

If you just need someone to help you with your Self Assessment in the short term, you can call HMRC. The person who’s helping you must be with you when you call -HMRCwill confirm their identity and check that you’re happy for them to represent you. For information about filing and paying your taxes, visit the http://www.acalculator.com/tax-calculators.html for data.

 

the asset store charges people different prices depending on where they live, which i assume accounts for the EU VAT laws

 

I know, my post made before the new VAT changes were live and at that point everyone from EU was charged the same Denmark VAT. However for the other points the EULA is misleading or was at least back then vs whats done in the store.

 

I recently had cause to research the new laws and I completely agree with what you wrote.

I can see how that might lead to confusion but I am able to interpret it in a way that is compatible with the EU regulations and the manner that Unity actually handles asset store transactions and VAT.

This clause is talking about payments made by Unity to the provider. It does not say that the provider is responsible for VAT related to the transactions that takes place between Unity and end users/asset store customers. And when it comes to VAT, those are the transactions that matter, and Unity is handling it.

The clause you highlight may cause confusion because it mentions VAT, but really they are just covering themselves by indicating that any tax issues resulting from their payments to you are your responsibility. But their payments to you are not the same thing as customers payments to them.

Income tax is the primary concern that needs to be declared. And certainly in the UK a related issue as to whether you also need to register as self-employed (even if you have a normal job at the same time). If you register as self-employed then there are additional National Insurance payments to be made, but I believe you can apply to be exempted from those if your self-employed income is below a certain level per year.

I've not sold anything on the asset store myself but I did register as self-employed and fill out tax returns since I first put a paid app on the play store. It wasn't terribly hard to do the tax return myself online, not that I had much choice since I wouldn't sleep if I avoided such responsibilities, and I didn't make enough money to even begin to cover the cost of an accountant. Personally I would recommend still filling in a tax return even if your income is well below the yearly income tax allowance,its better to declare everything even if there is no tax to pay.