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Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
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- Lemon Quarter
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Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
In retirement I have continued to pay retired membership fees to professional bodies (e.g. the IET). Do these count as Gift Aid Payments which I should sum together with my other Charitable payments in my tax return?
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- Lemon Half
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Re: Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
It is unlikely that professional subscriptions are Gift Aidable (retired or not).
Although it would appear that donations to IETConnect (the fancy name for the IET Benevolent Fund) would be, if this old thread elsewhere is correct:
https://communities.theiet.org/discussi ... t_id=77120
Although it would appear that donations to IETConnect (the fancy name for the IET Benevolent Fund) would be, if this old thread elsewhere is correct:
https://communities.theiet.org/discussi ... t_id=77120
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- Lemon Quarter
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Re: Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
PinkDalek wrote:It is unlikely that professional subscriptions are Gift Aidable (retired or not).
Many thanks for your response, and yes - that was my thought until I stumbled across the following from an HMRC document
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/gift-aid-wh ... rship-fees
An extract -
Membership subscriptions paid to some professional organisations on HMRC’s list of qualifying bodies can be treated as an expense deduction. Working members can claim tax relief on their subscription, but subscriptions can’t be treated as Gift Aid payments.
Retired or student members’ subscription fees can be treated as a Gift Aid payment, but they must confirm that they don’t have income from which they can deduct professional membership subscriptions.
I should add that my interest is largely academic.
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- Lemon Half
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Re: Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
From HMRC
That's academically interesting!
I've never been offered that opportunity to a faculty I still subscribe to (having fully paid up life membership for the rest). Having written that, my ongoing subscription is not to a charity so surely can't qualify. Whereas your https://www.theiet.org/ appears to be The Institution of Engineering and Technology. The Institution of Engineering and Technology is registered as a Charity in England & Wales (no 211014) and Scotland (no SC038698).
I'd therefore ask them the situation as it applies to you. You can make retrospective Gift Aid declarations I believe, if that is what they were.
scotia wrote:... Retired or student members’ subscription fees can be treated as a Gift Aid payment, but they must confirm that they don’t have income from which they can deduct professional membership subscriptions.
I should add that my interest is largely academic.
That's academically interesting!
I've never been offered that opportunity to a faculty I still subscribe to (having fully paid up life membership for the rest). Having written that, my ongoing subscription is not to a charity so surely can't qualify. Whereas your https://www.theiet.org/ appears to be The Institution of Engineering and Technology. The Institution of Engineering and Technology is registered as a Charity in England & Wales (no 211014) and Scotland (no SC038698).
I'd therefore ask them the situation as it applies to you. You can make retrospective Gift Aid declarations I believe, if that is what they were.
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- Lemon Quarter
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Re: Retired Membership - Gift Aid?
PinkDalek wrote:I'd therefore ask them the situation as it applies to you. You can make retrospective Gift Aid declarations I believe, if that is what they were.
Yes - that would normally be a sensible approach - but here we are dealing with engineers who love the intellectual challenge of solving tricky engineering problems, but who generally are less au fait with the monetary side. (So they end up being paid significantly less than certain other professions - but that's an irrelevant aside )
The IET only recently introduced a retired membership fee. Previously, unless you pleaded poverty, a retiree paid the full fee - although I'm not sure what the benefits were, and I suspect that retired members just ceased to be members. So having just retired from being a consulting engineer (in my mid seventies) I tried to change my membership to that of the newly introduced retired member (at a 50% discount to the full fee). Although this was advertised on their web site, there appeared to be no online method of obtaining this membership. So I emailed the IET, and received a prompt response which set my fee at a 50% discount, then incorrectly indicated that it was a reduced income discount (which it was not!!!). I emailed back a correction, and heard no more. So what do you think are the chances of anyone at the IET knowing whether or not a retired membership qualifies as a Gift Aid payment? Snowballs in Hell come to mind. And since the monetary gain which I might make is trivial, I shall only email them on the subject if I feel the need to tweak a tail - probably to no effect.
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