Explaining 'Eat Out To Help Out'
Restaurants, cafes and pubs offering dine-in meals, hotels and workplace cafes can take place in the Government’s Eat Out To Help Out scheme.
The scheme is for food and non-alcoholic beverages purchased to dine in.
It does not cover service charges and alcoholic beverages.
To calculate the discount you must first apply service charges and then deduct these and alcoholic drinks before working it out.
A £10 cap applies over the whole bill, so for multiple diners you can multiply the cap by the number of diners as one total without splitting the bill.
Example
4 diners (2 adults 2 children)
Workings Payment
Total bill £60 £60
Serv Charge £6 £6
Total payable £66 £66
Alcoholic -£10
Service charge -£6
Net amount for discount £50
Discount min of (50% or (£10x4)
-£25 -£25
(50% = £25 less than £40)
Customer pays £41
Business claims(discount amount) £25
To register
You can register from now until the closing date of August 31. You must apply the discount for the full period of August on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
You will need a government gateway ID and supply details of each establishment you have.
You will need to supply VAT number, PAYE ref and company tax reference, bank details and the address you receive your bank statements to.
Making claims
Claims can be made from August 7 and weekly from the first claim.
You cannot make a claim until you have registered for at least seven days. The claim period closes on September 30.
When claiming
You must supply details of the number of diners, the total value of charges to customers and the amount of discount given.
VAT is charged on the full bill amount, not the discounted amount and the income you receive from HMRC is taxable income.
