Clare Josa | Author And Keynote Speaker

UK's Foremost Imposter Syndrome Expert, International Keynote Speaker & 8x Author

EUVAT

Important EU VAT Update: What Happens To VATMOSS & The New Thresholds After Brexit?

Take Inspired Action

Remember the €10k threshold and sub-€100k simplifications we negotiated, which come into effect on 1st January 2019? Well, we’ve had confirmation from the EU Commission that UK microbusinesses will get to keep them for a whole 88 days. Here’s what will happen to VATMOSS and the new thresholds after Brexit.

This video is a really important update from the EU VAT Action Campaign team – one I had hoped I would never have to record.

Please spend a few minutes watching it and then follow the guidelines below this video to write to your MP. Please share this post far and wide in any microbusiness groups you’re part of.

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Guidelines For Writing To Your MP:

For the letter to your MP, please ask them to ensure we keep the current €10k threshold, the sub-€100k simplifications and the VATMOSS system during the transitional period, with a view to finding a permanent, workable solution.

The 3 Ps: please keep your letter:

  1. Polite – even if they think Brexit is a fab idea, they have to help you and are more likely to do so if you keep it polite.
  2. To the Point – one side of A4.
  3. Personal – telling them how this affects you, your business and your family.

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EU VAT Action Campaign Group

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Thank you!

x Clare

Author of Dare To Dream Bigger | Mentor to Passionate World Changers

Proof That Passionate World-Changer CAN Achieve The Impossible: Outcome Of EU Vote On EUVAT Thresholds

Create, Take Inspired Action

Three years ago this week a small group of businesswomen met for the first time, having only previously chatted on social media. They were surrounded by some of the most senior people in the UK’s Treasury and HMRC and a government minister, who told them nothing could be done about the EU VAT law change that had accidentally closed down thousands of micro businesses.

Those women gave them hell over a change to EU VAT laws that all 28 Member State governments had voted in, which risked putting millions of microbusinesses out of business – or forcing them to trade illegally.

The law was a good idea – to make you pay VAT on digital stuff (think eBooks / MP3s / software downloads) based on where the CUSTOMER was, not the selling business. It was intended to stop the likes of Apple and Amazon avoiding tax by locating in low-VAT countries.

BUT We Needed EU VAT Thresholds

The sledgehammer that cracked the nut didn’t realise that most online businesses:

  • Are tiny, compared to Amazon, so don’t have an international tax team
  • Automatically sell internationally, because that’s how the internet works
  • Don’t have access to the data to prove where our customers are in the way the laws required, so we could’t comply with the new rules

Over the following two years, the volunteers who supported the EU VAT Action Campaign:

  • proved the disastrous unintended consequences of these laws with a 2000-business quantitative study
  • met with the UK government, including the UK Prime Minister and the most senior policy advisers at Downing Street
  • evidenced the need for EU VAT thresholds and proved to the finance ministries that they wouldn’t lose out by agreeing to them
  • got consultative status with the UK’s HMRC, HM Treasury and the European Commission, so we could represent the thousands of businesses who desperately needed their help
  • represented those businesses at the 2015 Fiscalis event, with representatives of all 28 Member States’ Finance Ministries – which was pivotal in proving the need for thresholds and convincing Finance Ministers to consider them
  • raised the profile of the problem with savvy social media campaigns, including a Twitter storm that got #EUVAT trending
  • got thousands of micro businesses taking positive action – writing to their MEPs, visiting their MPs, getting the word out there to create an unignorable case for the need for change
  • giving keynote speeches at the European Parliament, to motivate MEPs, the European Commission and business organisations to take action

I am honoured to have been a co-founder of that group, to have given those keynotes and to have spoken at the Fiscalis event. I am immensely grateful to the thousands of businesses who supported us over the past three years.

On 1st December last year, Pierre Moscovici announced proposals for EU VAT thresholds. This was a HUGE achievement from EVERYONE , but the proposals had to spend a year going through Tax Committee meetings, being debated and looked at from every angle. They could have been derailed at any point. Ironically, the work we did meant that there was no way to rush these changes through. The EU Commission took the impact assessment very seriously.

Over the summer, 26 of the 28 Member States had agreed to a €10k EU VAT threshold (for non-domestic digital B2C sales), below which domestic VAT rules would apply, and €100k EU VAT threshold below which simplifications to the rules would apply, allowing growing businesses to keep trading. We continued to work with the EU Commission and key Member States to help address the remaining objections.

And today was the Big Day – ECOFIN – the meeting of all 28 Finance Ministers – had to vote on the legislative changes. Here is what happened:

The new EU VAT thresholds won’t come into effect until 1st January 2019, so we are urging micro business owners to write to their tax authority and Finance Minister to ask what can be done to help them keep trading until they legally become exempt from these rules.

Thank you so much to everyone who helped us with this campaign. Over and over we have been told that the reason it succeeded is because it was positive, evidence-based and proactive, rather than looking to blame or sling mud. We couldn’t have done it without your support.

If you’re covering this news and want to interview me for comments, you can reach me here.

And if you’ve got questions, we’re continuing the discussion in our Facebook group: EU VAT Action Campaign Group.

Thank you!

P.S. Know anyone who was stressed about these rules? Are you part of any small business groups? Please share this update with them!

Newsletter: Doing The ‘Inside Work’ That Will Change Your ‘Outside World’?

Authentically Awesome

Whats the difference between instinct intuition?Click here to read more: We were chatting over on Facebook this week about the difference between instinct, intuition and good old-fashioned common sense.

And despite having been an NLP Trainer for over a decade now, it never ceases to amaze me how a simple word can create such different meanings in everyone’s heads.

I have been amazed by the variety of answers we have had on this topic – and by the level of emotions that it evokes for people.
It all came up because I’m part of an International Summit this month where I’ll be interviewed about how I use ‘instinct’ for my business – and I realised, when preparing for this, that I don’t actually use my instinct, I use my intuition!

And this got me thinking about how I have used instinct or intuition on the EU VAT campaign we have been running since November. The breakthroughs we have achieved (even though there’s still a long way to go!) have been described by those ‘in the know’ as ‘impossible’ and ‘unprecedented’ – and we have had feedback that the way we have approached the campaign has been unique.

But we didn’t do fancy strategy work or play games or second-guess people’s motivations – all of which would have been typical in the business world, especially with my NLP and Engineering background.

In fact, intuition has played a key role in the campaign’s success. Want to know more? And how it could help you? Click here to read this week’s article.I also felt inspired to create a 7 day programme for you, if you’d like to dive in more deeply with your intuition. It’s free for everyone who registers before we go live, so if you’d like ‘in’, grab your place today on the Intuition Breakthrough Blueprint. (After we go live it will be $47).I’m extremely excited to be heading off to Turkey in a couple of days to prepare for our Authentically Awesome Business Mastermind retreat. There are still two places available, and if you want to join us, then the absolute final deadline is 5pm today. Please call me on +44 1342 777 635! And I’ve just opened the doors for advance booking for our October Mastermind Retreat – here’s where you can reserve your place.And I’ve got more for you! Get the date in your diary: I’m running a free webinar on April 30th where I’ll be spilling the beans on the 7 surprising keys to success in the EU VAT campaign. By the end of the hour you’ll have had a whistle-stop tour of the difference that has made THE difference in the campaign – and how you could use these keys to grow your business – or change your life. Here’s where you can register.

I hope you have a fantastic week. I’ll be doing my best to send a newsletter next week, but it’ll depend on the quality of my internet connection in Turkey!

With love, Namaste,

CJ SigP.S. I just checked and there are still 3 places available at the Early Bird rate for our Authentically Awesome Group Mastermind programme, which goes live when I get back from Turkey. So if you’ve been thinking of joining us, act now to get started today – and save. I’d really love to share this journey with you. xx C.

What’s The Difference Between Instinct, Intuition & Good Old-Fashioned Common Sense?

Inspirational Messages

We were chatting over on Facebook this week about the difference between instinct, intuition and good old-fashioned common sense.

And despite having been an NLP Trainer for over a decade now, it never ceases to amaze me how a simple word can create such different meanings in everyone’s heads.

I have been amazed by the variety of answers we have had on this topic – and by the level of emotions that it evokes for people.

It all came up because I’m part of an International Summit this month where I’ll be interviewed about how I use ‘instinct’ for my business – and I realised, when preparing for this, that I don’t actually use my instinct, I use my intuition!And this got me thinking about how I have used instinct or intuition on the EU VAT campaign we have been running since November. The breakthroughs we have achieved (even though there’s still a long way to go!) have been described by those ‘in the know’ as ‘impossible’ and ‘unprecedented’ – and we have had feedback that the way we have approached the campaign has been unique.

But we didn’t do fancy strategy work or play games or second-guess people’s motivations – all of which would have been typical in the business world, especially with my NLP and Engineering background.

In fact, intuition has played a key role in the campaign’s success.

For me (and I’m not saying I’m right!), ‘instinct’ is something primal that comes from the animal part of my brain. It’s that sense you get, for example, when you meet someone that tells you whether or not you can trust them – instantly. And it might get over-ruled by later logic and data, but it is a subconscious message to your thinking mind – especially when you are in danger.

The primal, animal part of your brain is specially designed to keep you safe from sabre toothed tigers and their friends, so it is brilliant at what I call ‘snap decision making’, here in the present moment, where thinking and rationalising could lead to the Permanent Exit Door.

After all, when you’re sprinting from a life-limiting carnivore, you don’t want to be fussing about next week’s ‘to do’ list. So the primal part of your brain is designed to handle immediate, short-term decision-making. And, for me, that’s my ‘instincts’.

But if you’re in business, short-term decision-making is unlikely to be a successful long-term growth strategy. It’s what I have seen leading to near-permanent chaos and fire-fighting, back in my corporate days.Instead, I prefer to rely on my ‘intuition’:

For me, intuition is something that feels like deeper wisdom and insight. It comes from outside of my ‘thinking’ brain. It’s something I just ‘know’ – and it always brings with it a wave of clarity, Truth and, often, relief.

It comes up when you get a sense of what is really needed in a situation – of what is ‘deeper Truth’, where the masks of ‘ego’ have fallen away and that intuition is something that just ‘is’, rather than something you ‘figured out’.

That is what has kept me going throughout the EU VAT campaign – often defying what my Inner Engineer’s rational common sense was recommending – and even what international lobbying and campaign experts were recommending.

By reconnecting with that deeper Inner Wisdom, I could somehow access a hidden depth of understanding about which actions were needed – and when.

I have lost count of the number of times when we have done the exact opposite of what rational common sense would recommend – and thereby achieved breakthroughs.

And I was hugely blessed to be supported by thousands of businesses who were ok with going with what might not have seemed immediately logical, but which somehow we all knew ‘felt’ right.

Just imagine being able to apply this to your business!

As I said, there are other techniques I have used, too, and I’ll be sharing the step by step ‘how to’ of my personal insider secrets with my Mastermind Members in an 8 week programme over May and June, but intuition is where it always starts.

But most of us are disconnected from our intuition, having been trained instead to put our faith in our Monkey Mind and its logical stories.

Yet, as Einstein said, a problem cannot be solved with the same level of thinking that created it.

True breakthroughs happen when you shift to your intuition – that level of ‘being’ that the Ancients call the Vignanamaya Kosha – the ‘wisdom body’ where you connect with the aspects of your Being that the conscious mind cannot understand.

And it transforms the way you approach your business – and life, in general.

That might sound a bit ‘woo woo’, but we’ve all had the experience of it. It’s the times when you wake up in the middle of the night and suddenly know the solution to a knotty problem. It’s when you’re in the shower and suddenly see the next step you need to take to leap to the outcome you were dreaming of. It’s when you somehow just ‘know’ who you need to phone – and when – only to find out that the person was about to call you, too.

Want to get some ‘how to’ for all of this? I’d love to make it easy for you!

And if you’d like to discover how connecting with your Intuition could transform your life – and business – then make sure you join me for the 7 day Intuition Breakthrough Blueprint programme – and experience for yourself why over 300 people have already fallen in love with it.

In just 10 minutes a day over the seven days, you’ll discover how to clear out the blocks to be able to access your intuition more reliably, when you need it most.

Here’s where you can grab your place now – and please share this link with anyone you know who would love to be part of this.

I’d LOVE to see you there! Click here to register now.

And I’d also love to hear from you, via the comments:

  • There’s no right & wrong – what is the difference between ‘intuition’, ‘instinct’ and ‘common sense’ for you?
  • How different does your life or business feel, if you use your intuition, rather than your rational mind?
  • Do you consciously connect with your intuition or just leave it to chance?

With love, Namaste,

CJ Sig

P.S. The Intuition Breakthrough Blueprint programme also covers how to handle your Inner Critic! Here’s where you can grab your place.

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