Braille Printer

[BoredBloke]

I need to buy one of these for my son

Braille Embosser

It's a lot of money to pay for essentially a clunky dot matrix printer - and this is a cheap one!! As it is not essential for my job (it's for the sprog) will I have any problems running it's cost through my company? I'll throw this one open to the masses for comments.

[milanbenes]

feck's sake Tone,

with all due respect there is a lot of business creativity lacking among th congregation


jeeeeeeeeeeez

why does your IT consultancy need a braile printer ?

because you want to produce business development material for blind organisations demonstrating how your consultancy can support their IT needs and you need to communicate with them through a medium which is accessible to them

u o me a bier

Milan.

[Lucifer Box]

Tony, you can run abasolutely anything (legal) you like through the company books. The real question is whether it is tax deductible for CT purposes and whether or not it needs to be declared as a BIK.

As you cannot really claim that this piece of equipment is required "wholly and exclusively", etc., in your case I would say the answers are 'no' and 'yes' respectively.

Alternatively, you could look at this with an entrepreneurial eye and consider expanding your business into the leasing of these machines. As the unit price is so high there must be a market for this I would have thought. Of course, you would need a demo model in your home office for when the occasional client wants to see one and if your son used it unbeknownst to you, well, who would know and what's the harm?

Who knows, there might be a whole new plan 'B' opening up in front of you.

And if you don't do it, someone else reading this might consider doing so. In fact, I might.

[BoredBloke]

Cheers for the responses. I had already made up my mind to run it through and was looking at a means to bat away any questions from the IR. My initial thought was along the lines of what milan came up with, but didn't think about the leasing option. I know that there are a lot of visually impaired people out there who would like this sort of kit, but cannot afford it and that leasing might be an idea, especially as I know of a fair few VI organisations who could help with this. Also, many councils would go for the lease option as many councils actually fund the purcahse of this sort of equipment for home use. It just so happens ours won't.

Also, everything ralating to VI equipment is massively expensive, so the embossers might just be the start of it. His screen reader for instance is £800.

As I can't read Braille, I might have to pay my son consultancy rates - although that might be pushing things.

[Lucifer Box]

Well done, Tony, now you're thinking like a real businessman. You are in a potential goldmine situation if your local council won't fund this sort of thing. If you are still IT contracting this time next year, you should kick yourself.

Remember, the best ideas are the ones in front of your face.

My invoice for the consultancy fees is in the post.

Now, would you like some marmalade?

[The Farmer]

Well done, Tony, now you're thinking like a real businessman. You are in a potential goldmine situation if your local council won't fund this sort of thing. If you are still IT contracting this time next year, you should kick yourself.

Remember, the best ideas are the ones in front of your face.

My invoice for the consultancy fees is in the post.

Now, would you like some marmalade?

[threaded]

Tony: Have you seen a product called Dolphin? I've sold a good few of these into various places where the employees are VI.

[BoredBloke]

Yes I had heard about Dolphin, but he has JAWS on his school laptop and so it figures that it is best to stick with the one he uses at school. Have tapped up somebody I used to work with in the states to get the Jaws s/w as it is available in the US for about £600 instead of the £800 it costs over here - partially due to the exchange rate I guess. Still bloody expensive though.

He did a sponsored Judo throw thing at his Judo club to raise the money needed for his embosser. Charity begins at home with this one!! He's gutted now because he has to hand over his cash.