Writing Magazine Archives - Page 10 of 12

Don’t Mess With The IRS!

18 February, 20267 August, 2020

Don’t let the IRS take a third of your self-published royalties. Simon Whaley takes you step-by-step through the IRS tax interview process.

No business likes giving away 30% of its income when it doesn’t have to, and that applies to your writing business too. If you’ve opened your first self-published royalty statement to discover 30% of your income has been withheld, you need to act now to stop it happening in the future.

It’s all down to the American Inland Revenue Service (IRS), which requires American companies to withhold 30% of any income earned through them by non-US citizens.

Most of us who self-publish do so via an American-based organisation, such as Amazon, Smashwords, Apple, or Draft2Digital. This means they all have to adhere to IRS regulations. Unless you’ve told these organisations to the contrary, they assume you owe the IRS tax on this royalty income that you’ve earned.

Proposing Prose

18 February, 20262 July, 2020

Securing a non-fiction book contract means having a business plan. Simon Whaley reveals what to put into your next book proposal

Do you have an idea for a great non-fiction book and want to secure a traditional publishing deal? Then what you need is a business plan.

Office Locations

18 February, 20261 June, 2020

Virginia Woolf famously called for a ‘room of her own’ in which to write. Simon Whaley chats to three wordsmiths about where they work and why. A year ago, the …

A Bigger Platform

18 February, 20269 May, 2020

Should self-published authors go exclusively Amazon, or dip their toes into the wider world of Kobo, Apple and more? Simon Whaley explores the pros and cons. Ask any self-published author …

You Can Bank On It

18 February, 20265 March, 2020

Has your writing business come of age? Simon Whaley looks at when to get a business bank account. We all remember our first time. It was 1989, I was 18, …

Successful Signings

18 February, 20266 January, 2020

The February 2020 issue of Writing Magazine is out now, and my Business of Writing column looks at how writers can organise their own booksignings in WHSmiths. Book signings are …

Understanding Your ALCS Statement

19 February, 202111 February, 2018

I love this time of year. March is when we get our free money from the ALCS. Free money? Oh, yes! However, from the many comments I’ve seen on social media, not everyone understands their ALCS statement. Many simply look at how much they’re getting and then file it ready for their tax return. But having a clearer understanding of what you’re receiving the money for may help ensure you claim everything to which you’re entitled.

What is ALCS?

The Authors Licensing and Collecting Society collects money generated by secondary rights from various sources and then distributes it to writers. When you sell an article or a short story to a magazine, you sell a primary right – a right to publish your work, for which you should be paid. But once a piece of your writing has been published, there are legitimate ways in which it can be scanned or photocopied. Organisations and business pay for this legitimate right to copy your work.

Taxing Transformations

19 February, 20213 January, 2018

Remember the plans for quarterly tax returns? Simon Whaley finds out what writers need to do now, in preparation.

If there’s one piece of writing most of us detest it’s completing our tax return. So when George Osborne announced in November 2015 the Making Tax Digital scheme, whereby self-employed people, such as writers, may need to complete quarterly tax returns, many feared the worst. How much of our future writing time would be gobbled up by the need to be creative with numbers?

However, plans for this were dropped from the Finance Bill that went through parliament just prior to last year’s general election. But this tax story hasn’t been buried like a murder writer’s latest victim. It’s simply sleeping, ready to reawaken in the near future. As writers, we need to start taking steps now.

Letter Feedback

29 April, 20205 October, 2016

It’s always nice when a reader writes in to a magazine’s letters page to comment on an article you’ve written (hopefully, for the right reasons!). So I was especially delighted …

Agent Attraction

19 February, 20215 October, 2016

Attracting an agent can be the start of a long business relationship. Simon Whaley flirts with two agents to learn more about the wooing process.

At this time of year many literary agents are talking Frankfurt. The Frankfurt Book Fair is one of the biggest gatherings of publishing professionals in the world. Over 600 agents from more than 300 agencies from over 30 countries will get together around tables at its Literary Agent and Scout Fair to negotiate rights and deals. As Jonny Geller, literary agent and joint CEO of agency Curtis Brown, says on the Frankfurt Book Fair website, ‘The Frankfurt Book Fair can transform the hopes and dreams of an author. A place where a book can go from a local idea to a global phenomenon.’

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