Team needs mobile chairs; do they buy or me?

[BeautyBGS]

I'm relatively new so this might be a dumb question, but some on my team need mobile fold up chairs for going on-site with clients. I'm not sure what is standard practice...the previous owner had chairs with custom logos on them, so I am planning to do the same. But I'm just not sure, do I pay for them and they use them as long as they are on the team (and theoretically, give them back when/if they decide to move on later?), or do I charge them for the chairs (in which case, I feel like they would want some input on whether they have the logo on them, what size/style/etc). I'm just not sure what the usual practice is.

 

[pure]

Are your team employed by you or self employed?

 

[AcidPerm]

If they're part of your team, then you need to provide the equipment necessary for them to do the job.
That would certainly be the case in the UK.

 

[BeautyBGS]

Are your team employed by you or self employed?

They are all independent contractors which is why I'm not 100% sure. One of them made a comment recently about when did she get her chair, as if she expected me to provide it, and another has her own that she purchased.

I've been told that if you provide equipment for contractors, you risk falling into that gray area where the government considers them employees (even though they provide everything else for client work).

I can buy them but don't want to risk doing something that I'll later be kicking myself for.

 

[hazelb]

Can you say that when they are working for you as contractor they are promoting your brand. So any branded stuff they have to use ( ie chairs, massage lotions, uniforms are provided by you as part of their branded equipment. They would just hand it back when they stopped contracting for you and not use it if they work for other people or themselves.

Think of someone installing Sky tv.

They may be contracted by Sky, but they turn up in a sky van, use tool boxes with sky written on then, wear a teeshirt / fleece with the sky logo on it...I doubt they provide any of those items themselves. If they then started up a 'Joe Bloggs installations' You wouldn't expect them to turn up with all the Sky kit...unless Sky forgot to ask for it back

Why don't you check out the help pages on the HMRC site or talk to them. That would be the definitive answer.

 

[AcidPerm]

The OP is based in the US so needs to check what the rules are over there.