Author Interview: Alan Pink

Practical Tax Planning for Business

Alan Pink is the author of Practical Tax Planning for Business which has been fully updated and revised for the 20/21 tax year.

Practical Tax Planning for Business covers a myriad of business tax topics, including VAT, corporation tax, property income tax (for landlords), and even inheritance taxes when passing on business assets.

This book is suitable for entrepreneurs who don’t lean heavily upon an accounting firm to process and file all of their tax returns.

It’s also highly effective as a refresher for any accountant working in the finance team of small to medium-sized businesses who has responsibility for tax compliance.

Even if you do utilise professional services to manage your tax risk, it’s still worth understanding the basic principles of business taxes and how to manage your business to minimise them, to help you make strategic decisions regarding the contractual, structural and legal setup of your business or group. With this book in hand, you’ll be less likely to engage in a contract or finance your business in a way that inadvertently exposes you to unnecessary tax.

Alan Pink is also the founder behind Alan Pink Tax (APT), which you’ll find at alanpinktax.com. APT specialises in the provision of tax advice to help you lawfully comply with tax rules whilst paying no more than legally required.

Alan write books which fall within the following book genres:

I contacted Alan a few months ago with a series of interview questions which he’s kindly replied to. So I will now publish those responses in full to this short interview below:

Interview with Alan Pink

Source: alanpinktax.com

Please could you tell us a little about your professional background and why you felt inspired to write the book?

Alan: I have been advising clients on how to save tax in their businesses and investment portfolios for over 30 years, and I saw a gap in the provision of published information for such people. There are plenty of textbooks for experts, and a lot of information on the internet, some much more reliable than others.

But nowhere could I find a book that explained practical tax saving strategies in straightforward language, and I decided that my book should be different. Not really. All of the advice in the book is based on our actual experience in the real world.

In the course of researching and writing your book – did you come across anything that surprised you?

Alan: Not really.  All of the advice in the book is based on our actual experience in the real world. 

For budding financial writers, what is the one piece of advice would you give to those writing to educate beginners about finance?

Alan: Always answer the questions that people are actually asking, not the ones you think they should be asking.

What else do you have going on that you’d like our readers to know about?

Alan: We’ve got the Business Start-up Guide in preparation, and hopefully that will be appearing very shortly on the PP Publishing website. We’re also at an advanced stage in completing a book on Practical Tax Planning for Property.

And finally, I like to ask all authors; when saving and investing your own money, what is your preferred investing style?

Alan: Although I’ve got some paper investments, and a small Self Invested Person Pension, I’m very much a property man! And I practise what I preach. My investments are set out in what I see as an optimally tax-efficient structure.

We would like to take this opportunity to extend our thanks Alan and the APT team again for participating in this finance book author interview series. We hope that both the Business Start-up Guide and Practical Tax Planning for Property books are launched to critical acclaim.