Tax for self-employed cleaners
Reviewed by Rob Webb, practising accountant since 2015 · Last reviewed September 2026 · Figures are for the 2026/27 tax yearReviewed by Rob Webb, practising accountant since 2015 · Last reviewed September 2026 · Figures are for the 2026/27 tax yearDo you clean for your own clients? If you take your own bookings and set your own hours, you're usually self-employed. Once your takings pass £1,000 in a tax year, you must register with HMRC by 5 October after that year ends.
How much tax will you pay? On £23,800 of takings with £4,426 of costs, about £1,769 in tax and National Insurance for 2026/27.
Want to check your own costs? See what you can claim as a cleaner →
This is the first thing to settle, because it changes everything else.
You are probably self-employed if you find your own clients, set your own prices, choose which jobs to take, provide your own products and equipment, and could send someone else in your place. You invoice or you are paid in cash at the end of the job, and nobody deducts tax before you are paid.
You are probably employed if an agency or a company tells you which houses to clean and when, supplies the products, pays you an hourly rate whether or not the client is happy, and will not let you send a substitute. In that case they should be running PAYE and deducting tax before you are paid. Some agencies label cleaners "self-employed" to avoid that. Labelling does not decide it — the working arrangement does.
Plenty of cleaners are both. You might do twelve hours a week for an agency on PAYE and clean four private houses at the weekend on your own account. That is completely normal. The private work is your self-employment; the agency work goes on the employment pages of your return.
There is a £1,000 trading allowance for 2026/27. If everything you earn from self-employment in the tax year comes to £1,000 or less before expenses, you generally do not need to register or file for that income.
The test is on gross takings, not profit. If you took £1,600 and spent £700 on products and petrol, you are over the line — £1,600 counts, not £900.
The government announced in March 2025 that this threshold would rise to £3,000. No start date has been confirmed on gov.uk, so £1,000 is still the operative figure for 2026/27.
Cash makes no difference. Money paid to you in notes from a client's kitchen counter is taxable income exactly as a bank transfer is. If you do not bank it, it still counts.
Here is a cleaner with a steady round of private houses in 2026/27.
| Takings for the year | £23,800 |
| Cleaning products and materials | £1,240 |
| Mileage — 4,800 business miles at 55p | £2,640 |
| Public liability insurance | £96 |
| Mobile phone, business share | £180 |
| Working from home flat rate, £10 a month | £120 |
| Gloves, overalls, protective kit | £150 |
| Total expenses | £4,426 |
| Profit | £19,374 |
| Less personal allowance | £12,570 |
| Taxable profit | £6,804 |
| Income tax at 20% | £1,360.80 |
| Class 4 National Insurance at 6% | £408.24 |
| Total due | £1,769.04 |
Class 2 National Insurance is no longer a compulsory weekly charge. Because this profit is above the Small Profits Threshold of £7,105, Class 2 is treated as paid at no cost, so the contribution record towards the State Pension is protected without paying anything.
| What you can claim | What to watch |
|---|---|
| Cleaning products, cloths, bin bags, refills | Keep the receipts even for £3 supermarket spends — they add up to hundreds over a year |
| Vacuum, steam cleaner, mop systems, carpet machine | If you also use it at home, claim only the business share |
| Mileage between clients at 55p a mile for the first 10,000 miles, 25p after | Home to your first job of the day is usually not business travel. Keep a simple log of dates and journeys |
| Public liability insurance and key-holder cover | Cover for your own home contents is not a business cost |
| Overalls, tabards, gloves, non-slip shoes | Protective and branded workwear only. Ordinary clothes you happen to clean in are not allowable |
| DBS check where a client or agency requires one | Personal ID renewals like a passport are not allowable |
| Phone and internet, business proportion | You must work out a fair share, not claim the whole bill |
| Working from home flat rate — £10 a month for 25–50 hours, £18 for 51–100 hours, £26 for 101+ | This covers the admin you do at home. There is no flat rate below 25 hours a month, and it excludes phone and internet |
| Accountancy and bookkeeping software | — |
| Advertising, leaflets, a simple website | — |
Being paid in cash, and then not recording it.
Most cleaners are honest and still get this wrong, because there is no paperwork to remind you. A client pays £45 on a Tuesday, you spend it on shopping on the Wednesday, and by January it has vanished from your memory and from any record. Multiply that by a year and your declared turnover can be thousands of pounds short.
HMRC does not need your bank statements to notice. It uses data from cleaning platforms and agencies, and it compares declared profits against how people appear to be living. A cleaner who declares £6,000 of profit while paying £900 a month in rent invites a question.
The fix costs nothing. Write the date, the client and the amount in a notebook or a notes app the moment you are paid. That single habit is the difference between a return you can stand behind and one you are guessing at.
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax replaces the once-a-year return with four quarterly updates plus a final declaration. You are brought in based on your qualifying income, which is gross self-employment turnover plus gross property income added together, before expenses, on your previous year's return.
The cleaner above, on £23,800 of takings, would join in April 2028. A cleaner whose qualifying income stays at £20,000 or below is out of MTD altogether as the rules currently stand.
Quarterly updates are due 7 August, 7 November, 7 February and 7 May, and they are cumulative — each one runs from the start of the tax year, not just the three months. The final declaration is still due 31 January. Late submissions attract points: one per miss, and a £200 penalty at four points.
Filing late costs £100 straight away even if you owe nothing, then £10 a day after three months up to £900, then further penalties at six and twelve months.
If your cleaning takings are under £1,000 for the year, you do not need an accountant and you probably do not need to file at all. Keep a record in case you grow.
If you are one person, with a handful of clients, no employees, mileage and products as your only real costs, and you are comfortable with a spreadsheet, HMRC's own online return is free and takes most cleaners under an hour. There is nothing clever to be done with a simple set of figures, and paying someone to type them in is optional.
If you are only employed through an agency on PAYE, with no private clients at all, you almost certainly have no return to file.
If you cannot afford professional help and you are behind with returns, ring HMRC before you ring anyone else. They set up payment plans, and TaxAid offers free help to people on low incomes.
Yes. Cash is taxable income in exactly the same way as a bank transfer, whether or not you deposit it. Record the date, the client and the amount each time you are paid.
The facts of the working arrangement decide, not the label in the contract. If the agency controls your hours and clients, provides the materials and will not accept a substitute, that points to employment. HMRC's online status checking tool will give you a view, and you can challenge an agency's classification.
Usually not. Travel from home to a regular first client is treated like commuting. Travel between clients during the day is business mileage, claimable at 55p a mile for the first 10,000 miles in 2026/27 and 25p after that.
Add them together. The trading allowance of £1,000 covers all your self-employment combined, not £1,000 per activity, and you report the combined figures.
Only if your turnover passes £90,000 in any rolling 12-month period. Very few sole-trader cleaners get there, though a cleaner with a team can.
Register and bring the earlier years up to date. Penalties are lower when you come forward yourself than when HMRC comes to you, and HMRC will usually agree instalments if you cannot pay in one go.
Filed Tax files Self Assessment and Making Tax Digital returns for cleaners. It is £25 a month, which covers all four quarterly updates, the year-end final declaration, unlimited questions and deadline reminders, and the first month is free. You send your figures, Rob Webb reviews the return, and it is filed. Call 020 3637 6060.
Rob is a Certified Xero Advisor with a BSc from the University of Salford. Last reviewed September 2026 against GOV.UK guidance current at that date. This guide is general information, not personal tax advice. Figures are for the 2026/27 tax year and can change at each Budget — always confirm the current numbers on GOV.UK or ask us to check your situation.