Received Certificate from HMRC

[Martin G]

Received my certificate from HMRC, I am now registered as a brewer!! Slightly daunted by the three page letter, the accounting requirements and threats of £250 fines if I get something wrong or late. I have also just doubled the cost of every brew I do, but;

I can legally give away my beer to friends.
I can legally donate a cask to local beer festivals, sports clubs, school events etc.

For me half the fun is in the sharing, does not really add that much to the cost, as long as I don't get fined. The grey area is if I can sell a cask without an off sales licence, not a big deal, but if I were able to sell the odd one then it would help offset the extra cost of the beer duty.

[6470zzy]

I imagine that congratulations are in order Well done and I hope that your new certification works well for you.

Cheers

[Belter]

Well done! I share your opinions. I enjoy sharing my beer with people. Sounds like a big step though. Is it as simple as making a registration? Do you have a business premises? Surely you'll make a loss every year, having a f*&k load of expenses, a meagre profit and in the end get inspected by HMRC?

[TonyT40]

So how does it work then? Did you have to buy the cert? Do you have to pay tax on every brew you give away?

[Martin G]

You just fill out the form on the HMRC web site and send it in. Once registered then duty is payable on all beer brewed, it works out to about £8 per 4.5gal for a 4% beer. There are record requirements, key bits of information are needed on the brew sheet, a malt record for each of the malts, a racking record and a duty account and a return has to be submitted every month. At our sort of scale that should not be too hard, just a case of getting organised.

In my case it's all a bit of an experiment to be honest, I have registered my house. I am hoping it opens more options for my brewing, but it is not a business or anything like that. If it is more hastle than it's worth then I stop and just brew for myself again.

[AceMcAce]

You just fill out the form on the HMRC web site and send it in. Once registered then duty is payable on all beer brewed, it works out to about £8 per 4.5gal for a 4% beer. There are record requirements, key bits of information are needed on the brew sheet, a malt record for each of the malts, a racking record and a duty account and a return has to be submitted every month. At our sort of scale that should not be too hard, just a case of getting organised.

In my case it's all a bit of an experiment to be honest, I have registered my house. I am hoping it opens more options for my brewing, but it is not a business or anything like that. If it is more hastle than it's worth then I stop and just brew for myself again.

Won't you still have to pay tax on it? or do you mean you pay tax on beer that is brewed for others, but not on beer for yourself.

[Martin G]

I think once registered you have to pay the duty on everything that you brew, unless it is spoilt. If I find it too much hastle then I will de-register, in which case I can only brew for myself again.

[boingy]

HMRC, despite their reputation, are generally very fair. Their aim is to apply the rules and the problems usually only arise when the rules are not clear enough or when they don't understand the situation.

So the advice is: when in doubt contact them. I've had a few dealings with them and they are usually only too happy when someone asks for advice rather than guessing or winging it. It's important to keep a record of any advice they give you and who gave you it just in case they rules get interpreted differently by someone else in future.

They are hot on deadlines so make sure you submit whatever information and payment they require on time. The first couple of submissions will be fiddly but once you get your record keeping sorted it can be a breeze. And the record keeping does not have to be a difficult thing. A spreadsheet and a box file might be all you need.

And having registered as a brewer you'd be daft not to consider getting a licence to sell the stuff. Make sure you get the right one though!

[Martin G]

Thanks for that Boingy. I've been making tables to colect the information today, I think the following covers the record requirements. Have tried to copy them from excel and the lines have disappeared, but may be of interest. Now I've had a chance to get my head around it I don't think shouldn't be too hard to do, starting to think deadlines may prove to be the problem;

Brewing record
ensure it includes Gyle number, Target Gravity, Brew Name, Brew Date, OG, FV


Malt record table (per Malt)
Date Description IN (kg) OUT (kg) Stock (kg)

Racking record table
Date Gyle Number Cask Pin Bottles Other

Duty Calc
edit - this table completely loses the format when posted
Gyle Number
ABV calc
OG FG f ABV (%)
Brew - = X =
Priming - = X =

Vol (l) ABV(%)
Brew x =
Priming x = Racked ABV(%)
Total 1/ x =

Duty calc
Vol (l) ABV(%) Duty Rate Small Duty
/ 100 x X x 0.5 =

Duty Account
Period
Duty due on beer released from suspension
Underdeclarations
Overdeclarations
Net Duty Due
Spoilt Beer
Drawback
Net amount of duty Due
Date paid (duty point)

[WishboneBrewery]

Congrats Hope you can make a few quid, might be worth doing a farmers Market I think all you need is a personal license.

[alix101]

Congrats Hope you can make a few quid, might be worth doing a farmers Market I think all you need is a personal license.

yes you need a personal alcohol licence , they aren't difficult to get or expensive however once you have it you are legal to sell ,.just like any brewery ...well unless planning get involved (I'm sure they won't) but tuning a home as a commercial buisness changes alot.Drainage water rates commercial buisness rates ...
But what people don't know won't hurt

[Martin G]

Thanks for the steer with the personal licence, had not heard of that before. Looks like a £100-150 training course is needed, if you are not a member of the Vinters of London, Green cloth or Cambridge University!

Cannot work out if a personal licence is needed sell to someone with a temporary events notice, club premises certificate or premises licence, if not (and it may be wishful thinking) then that may give the options needed.

[boingy]

And of course the licensing is entirely separate from the HMRC stuff, which means there is a different set of hoops to jump through and a whole different set of people to keep happy, in this case the council. I can only hope that the council licensing department you deal with is of a higher calibre than the waste and recycling department I'm currently dealing with.

[seymour]

Fascinating, thanks for sharing. We don't have anything like this in the USA. Congratulations and good luck.

[darkonnis]

I seem to remember that you yourself don't need a personal license to sell alcohol as I mentioned it before and the mrs said she could have done it for me (she has her license) its just a case of having someone licensed sell it for you, you also don't need the long course for publicans, its a brewers one for selling to businesses and individuals offsite (ie you deliver), selling from your house is a different beast entirely (ie, you dont deliver, people come to your property for collection/ to drink on the premises)

Also, am I correct in thinking you don't pay duty on beer you brew for yourself, but you have to mark it down as "research or testing" or something? Can't for the life of me remember where I read that though, might be the microbrewers hand book?

Grats anyway,
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