HMRC Making Tax Digital – What You Need To Know

We received a number of emails and calls yesterday and today following a webinar presented by another company in our industry. The webinar purported to be in connection with HMRC’s Making Tax Digital strategy but turned out to be not much more than rouse to sell mobile app development services.

Unfortunately, its content rather unsettled the customers that contacted us, so I’ve written this blog to set out where the industry currently sits with the strategy and how it could affect practitioners and their firms…

Digital Tax Accounts and Quarterly Reporting

The Government today released a new document about Digital Tax Accounts. Entitled Making Tax Digital, it consolidates information that has been released into the public domain since the March Budget and lays out the roadmap by which HMRC will transform from its current regime to the new digital one.

Having read numerous articles in the press these last few days, many reporters have reiterated the fact that Digital Tax Accounts, both for individuals and businesses, will be the norm by 2020. However, what seems to have slipped somewhat under the radar by a few is the requirement for “most” self employed people and landlords to make quarterly returns from April 2018…

The Digital Tax Account – Public Beta and a New Name

On Tuesday 1 December 2015, HMRC formally launched the public beta of the Digital Tax Account, now renamed the Personal Tax Account (PTA).

The new service, as with all new Government projects, is to be delivered in a piecemeal fashion. In this article, we’ll take a look at what it can do…

The Office of Tax Simplification on Small Companies

The Office of Tax Simplification have released a survey to collect opinion about the taxes that small businesses pay to HMRC. The overall aim is to help them make recommendations to the powers that be that set our taxes.

The survey is open to those businesses that employ 10 or fewer people and covers all taxes.

If you would like to take part and voice your opinions, please follow this link.

HMRC Publishes Response to Penalties Consultation

Back in February of this year, HMRC kicked off a public consultation on the penalties it issues to taxpayers and the reasons why. It’s highly likely that the UK tax regime will become more automated in the coming years and with it, so too will be the application of penalties.

Computers need rules to apply. But what should the new rules look like?

Curiously, the document showed that HMRC wanted to make itself look more fair in how penalties were determined and applied, rather than the hard-and-fast approach taken today.