MEANING OF THE TERM “ SCHEDULES ” 29 
runs away, and breaks the shafts, the repairs would 
be a proper business charge; bub if the same man 
drives out to a social gathering, gets too social, and 
runs over a wayfarer on his return journey, the bill 
for damages would certainly not be a business expense, 
though it is the same horse and the same trap, with 
the same driver. 
In the same way, if a man provides for his family 
wants from the shop, he must add the value of the 
goods so taken to his sales, unless, which is rarely the 
case, he puts the equivalent money in the till at the 
time. But if his assistant embezzles from the till, 
that is a trade expense. 
A person making a loss on one trade may set it off 
against profit on another trade, and any sum paid 
out for Excess Profit Duty may be charged as a trade 
expense. 
Money laid out for improvements, or extensions of 
the business, is not allowable. Where a man takes a 
shop and spends £200 in refitting it to suit his own 
class of trade, that is an outlay of capital. If after 
an interval he does up the shop and takes the oppor- 
tunity of installing electric light instead of gas, the 
cost of the painting is a proper deduction, but not 
the wstallation of the electric light. 
It is open to question how far the cost of a 
sudden outlay on advertising an established busi- 
ness could be legally allowed: but the tendency is 
to allow it. 
It is a matter of everyday occurrence in a tax office 
for some tradesman to “ appeal against an assess- 
ment of, say, £300, saying that his profits are only