Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 section 352

Limited deduction for agency fees paid by entertainers

Section 352 allows employed entertainers to claim a tax deduction for fees they pay to agents who find them work, subject to a cap based on a percentage of their taxable earnings.

• Entertainers — defined as actors, dancers, musicians, singers or theatrical artists — may deduct agency fees (including any VAT) from their employment earnings, provided the fees are calculated as a percentage of those earnings.
• The total deduction in any tax year is capped at 17.5% of the entertainer's taxable earnings from the employment in that year.
• Agency fees must be actually paid (not merely owed) under a contract with a person running an employment agency for profit, or under an arrangement with a qualifying co-operative society or its members acting as the entertainer's agent.
• A co-operative society does not qualify if its main objective is to generate profits for paying interest, dividends or bonuses on money invested, deposited with, or lent to the society or any other person.