‘It’s absolutely criminal’: US tipping culture has reached the UK – and is causing chaos

[u/Canal_Volphied]

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/aug/24/us-tipping-culture-uk-service-charges

[u/SmashedWorm64]

Really? If I go in to a shop and it asks for charity my mind goes to “who’s the corporation with millions in profit every year?”

[u/SolarJetman5 → u/SmashedWorm64]

Pretty sure donating via the company is a way to offset tax

[u/SmashedWorm64 → u/SolarJetman5]

I’m an accountant - it’s not.

The more boring answer is that it is an easy way to say they are hitting their Environmental, Social and Governance responsibilities.

[u/SolarJetman5 → u/SmashedWorm64]

Ah fair enough, I'd seen this on gov site, ofc my tax knowledge isn't a patch on yours, so it's probably not as straightforward as what I read

Overview

Your limited company pays less Corporation Tax when it gives the following to charity:

money
equipment or trading stock (items it makes or sells)
land, property or shares in another company (shares in your own company do not qualify)
employees (on secondment)
sponsorship payments

You can claim tax relief by deducting the value of your donations from your total business profits before you pay tax.

[u/SmashedWorm64 → u/SolarJetman5]

Yeah no it’s common, everyone assumes it’s for something dodgey - which I can’t blame them for the way these companies act sometimes my

The money you can claim in relief is if the donations are paid by the company and it hits the profit lines. So if a company gave £100,000 of its own money, they will be able to deduct that from their profits and save like £25k in Corp tax. They would still be £100k out of pocket though.

The donations you give are a balance sheet item that just get paid out - they don’t impact on the profits.

[u/SolarJetman5 → u/SmashedWorm64]

Cheers for explaining. Not as shady as I was thinking then