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HMRC “is your business in investment?” meaning on Sole Trader tax form

So I’m signing up for Self Assessment via HMRC, as I’m a media student looking for Freelance media industry work now that I’m graduating.

I’m filling out the Sole Trader/Self Assessment HMRC form, and have come across a weird snag. One of the final questions is “Is your business in investment?”

There’s no little “?” icon next to it to explain what that means, nothing else on the HMRC or government website, and web searches bring up practically nothing (except other forms asking the same question).

It’s too late to talk to a human supervisor, so I got stuck talking to a fairly useless chatbot that either said “I can’t answer that question” or sent me links to HMRC help sections that had nothing to do with my query.

I haven’t done any Freelance work yet so this is all preemptive, but I do want to get this sorted as soon as I can. I am technically going to invest in myself as an independent freelancer (as in possibly paying for software, equipment hire etc), so would that be a yes?

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Original post
by Garth Marenghi
So I’m signing up for Self Assessment via HMRC, as I’m a media student looking for Freelance media industry work now that I’m graduating.
I’m filling out the Sole Trader/Self Assessment HMRC form, and have come across a weird snag. One of the final questions is “Is your business in investment?”
There’s no little “?” icon next to it to explain what that means, nothing else on the HMRC or government website, and web searches bring up practically nothing (except other forms asking the same question).
It’s too late to talk to a human supervisor, so I got stuck talking to a fairly useless chatbot that either said “I can’t answer that question” or sent me links to HMRC help sections that had nothing to do with my query.
I haven’t done any Freelance work yet so this is all preemptive, but I do want to get this sorted as soon as I can. I am technically going to invest in myself as an independent freelancer (as in possibly paying for software, equipment hire etc), so would that be a yes?

No i dont think you need to tick that box. "Investment" normally means putting money into shares or bonds with the aim to gain a profit, not buying business assets.

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