Red, red wine – a bluffer’s guide to carry forward
It’s spring and every young person’s thoughts turn (naturally) to carry forward.
This is of course a technical subject and should be treated with due seriousness but given the simply huge potential for misinterpretation of the rules I decided to turn to another springtime preoccupation – getting back into those summer clothes.
Let us suppose (purely for the purposes of the exercise) that I am currently a wee bit overweight and am on a diet. One of the conditions of the diet is that I can have no more than 1 glass of wine each day (it’s a generous diet) and can carry forward any unused wine allowance from the previous 3 days.
It’s Saturday and I am meeting up with friends and want to calculate how many glasses of wine I can have.
Step 1. 
I have today’s allocation of wine = 1 glass.
Step 2.
If I haven’t had any 
wine in the last 3 days I could add 3 glasses more.
Step 3.
However I was away with work
on Wednesday and Thursday evening and did succumb to half a glass of wine each evening. This must be offset against the wine allowance, leaving me with a half glass limit on both days.
Step 4.
I add the remaining total of the 
3 days to today’s allocation and calculate I can have 3 glasses on Saturday night and not exceed my limit.
And that’s that.
But …
… supposing there are a couple of extra rules. I have an overall calorie limit each day, and there is an additional penalty for any excess carbohydrates.
Step 5. 
Unfortunately, I also had a scone on Friday and there is an especially tempting piece of cake on the menu. If I have both my allowance would be further reduced to offset the extra calories.
Step 6.
Lastly, there is a ridiculous rule which says that my piece of cake carries a special penalty which means my allowance for today and every other day from now on is cut to a mere thimbleful!
There is however a quirk in this which still allows me to have up to half a glass of Chateau de Defined Benefits so long as I have a bottle open, but I would still have to give up the 3 half-glasses from Wed-Friday as these wouldn’t be allowed.
After thinking long and hard, I decide to have all the wine first, then eat the cake. This means the restriction on using the last 3 days allowance doesn’t apply until after I’ve already drunk it!
Step 4 again.
The total allowance from all 4 days, including the white wine, is now just under 2 glasses.
Simple isn’t it!
Now all you carry forward fans have to do is consider that each glass of wine represents £40K, and each glass represents a tax year. This should be easy, but just in case:
*Benefit Crystallisation Event
And…
… if all this doesn’t help, just drink the wine instead!
