Three calculators that answer the questions we are actually asked: what will land in the bank, whether gross payment status is worth applying for, and whether this particular invoice needs VAT on it. Nothing is stored and nothing is emailed unless you ask.
What will actually land in your bank on an invoice, with the materials split applied properly and the reverse charge taken into account.
Open the toolWhether you would pass the turnover test as a sole trader, a partnership or a company — and what the compliance test now includes.
Open the toolSix questions and you will know whether to charge VAT on an invoice or to state that the customer accounts for it.
Open the toolRead the numbers properly
They are estimates on the figures you type in, and they are not advice on your position. Two limits worth knowing before you rely on an answer.
The gross payment status checker tests turnover, not compliance. The turnover test is the easy one — £30,000 for a sole trader, £30,000 multiplied by the number of partners or relevant persons for a partnership or company, or £100,000 in total as an alternative, all measured on relevant payments in the 12 months before the application and excluding VAT and the cost of materials. The compliance test is the real hurdle, it covers CIS, PAYE, Self Assessment, corporation tax and — since 6 April 2024 — VAT, and no calculator can tell you whether you have met every obligation on time.
The reverse charge checker cannot see your notifications. Whether your customer is an end user or an intermediary supplier depends on them telling you so in writing. Absent that notification the reverse charge is the default, and the checker assumes you know which notifications you hold.
How to read the answers
The CIS deduction calculator shows you the cash. Put in the invoice total and the materials you bought yourself, and it applies the deduction to the labour element only — which is the part most people get wrong on paper, because the deduction is not charged on the whole invoice unless the whole invoice is labour. It also lets you see the difference between materials you directly incurred and materials the contractor reimbursed, because those two produce completely different answers from identical figures.
The gross payment status checker answers one of the three tests. The turnover test is arithmetic: relevant payments in the 12 months before application, excluding VAT and the cost of materials, against £30,000 for a sole trader, £30,000 per partner or relevant person, or £100,000 in total. What it cannot answer is the compliance test, which asks whether every obligation across CIS, PAYE, Self Assessment, corporation tax and VAT was met on time. That is the test that fails applications, and it needs somebody to look at your actual filing record.
The reverse charge checker walks the six conditions in the order they have to be answered — is it a construction operation within CIS, is it CIS-reportable, are both parties VAT and CIS registered, is the supply standard or reduced rated, and has the customer notified end-user or intermediary status. What it assumes is that you know which notifications you hold. If you do not, that is the thing to fix first, because absent a written notification the reverse charge is the default and charging VAT normally creates an error on both sides.
All three run in your browser. The figures you type are not transmitted to us, not saved and not visible to anyone. There is no sign-up, no email wall and no results emailed unless you choose to ask us about them.
The free CIS review does what none of these can: it reads your actual returns and statements and tells you what is wrong with them.
One short email: what has changed in CIS and construction VAT, the dates coming up, and one number worth checking on your own invoices. No spam, unsubscribe any time.