Revenue Incentives

Start your own Business Relief Scheme

The Start Your Own Business scheme provides for relief from Income Tax for long term unemployed individuals who start a new business. The scheme will provide an exemption from Income Tax up to a maximum of €40,000 per annum for a period of two years to individuals who set up a qualifying business having been unemployed for a period of at least 12 months prior to starting the business. The relief is available from 25 October 2013 to 31 December 2018.

Who qualifies for this relief?

You may qualify for this relief if:

(a) you have been unemployed for twelve months or more, and

(b) during that period you were in receipt of any of the following:

crediting contributions;
jobseeker’s allowance;
jobseeker’s benefit;
the one-parent family payment;
partial capacity payment.

Periods of time spent on certain training courses and schemes will be treated as part of a period of unemployment. If you were entitled to jobseeker’s allowance or jobseeker’s benefit immediately before starting on the training course or scheme, then any allowance paid for attending such a course will be treated as if it were jobseeker’s allowance or jobseeker’s benefit.

Examples of training courses and schemes would include FÁS training courses, Community Employment Schemes, Job Initiative and Back to Education Schemes.

Full particulars of this scheme are available on Revenue’s website at www.revenue.ie.

Tax Relief for New Start-up Companies (Section 486C Taxes Consolidation Act 1997)

Relief from Corporation Tax for new start-up companies for the first three years of trading is provided for in section 486C Taxes Consolidation Act (TCA) 1997.

The relief is provided in respect of profits of a new trade and chargeable gains on the disposal of assets used in the trade.

Relief applies where the total Corporation Tax payable for an accounting period does not exceed €40,000, with marginal relief available on a tapering basis where total Corporation Tax payable is between €40,000 and €60,000. The value of the relief is linked to the amount of employers’ PRSI paid by a company in an accounting period, subject to a maximum of €5,000 per employee and an overall limit of €40,000.

Credit is also given for any employers’ PRSI exempted under the Employer Job (PRSI) Incentive Scheme in respect of a company’s employees in determining the amount of Corporation Tax relief available to the company. Exclusions from relief The scheme does not apply to a trade which was previously carried on by another person or formed part of another person’s trade, a trade of dealing in or developing land or exploration and extraction of natural resources, a trade consisting of “service company” activities as defined in section 441 TCA 1997 (includes close companies whose businesses consist of the carrying on of a profession or the provision of professional services, or of exercising an office or employment).

The exclusion also applies to a trade set up by a new company, the activities of which, if carried on by an associated company of the new company, would form part of an existing trade carried on by that associated company.

Details of the scheme of relief from Corporation Tax for new start-up companies available from www.revenue.ie

SURE Tax Incentive Scheme

If you are interested in starting your own company, you may be entitled to an income tax refund of up to 41% of the capital that you invest under SURE. Depending on the size of your investment you may be entitled to a refund of income tax paid over the 6 years prior to year in which you invest.

How do I know how much tax I can get back if I want to start a business?

A refund calculator has been developed, which can be found at www.sure.gov.ie. This will allow you to create a printout outlining your potential refund that you can then bring to the bank or to show other potential investors to build up the capital you need to get started. The information you need for the calculator to estimate how much tax you paid can be found on your P60 or P21.

More Information – Download Leaflet IT15 from www.revenue.ie

Contact Details

Queries in relation to the operation of this scheme should be e-mailed to SUREadmin@revenue.ie or by telephone (01) 702 4107.

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