self-assessment deadline looms

Accountants say that they are stuck in a “big black hole of frustration” as they wait for their clients to get the unique taxpayer reference code they need to sign up to self-assessment.

The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, which has more than 150,000 members, warns that thousands will miss the January 31 deadline for returns for the 2020-21 tax year because of huge delays in processing requests for the codes.

The institute said you could use a workaround to pay tax without filing a return, using your national insurance number, but said that you may need professional accountancy software to make sure you did it right.

Claire Roberts from the accountancy firm Moore Kingston Smith warned against trying the workaround: “The only way you could realistically go through a manual approach is to engage a professional accountant who can use their own software to calculate your tax bill based on your earnings.

If you file your tax return late, you could be fined £100, but you should avoid the fine as long as you send it within 3 months of getting the code. The tax office sends codes out in the post, regardless of whether you are completing your tax return online or on paper.

If you pay late you can be fined 2.6 per cent of the tax owed and another 5 per cent on March 2.

Anyone filling out a tax return for the first time could miss the self-assessment deadline in January because of huge delays at HM Revenue & Customs.

HMRC said: “We are now working through the stocks of post and clerical interventions that built up over the past year, as we prioritised delivery of the government’s Covid-19 support packages, the UK’s smooth transition from the EU and the essential services that keep the tax system running.

Summarised www.sba.tax

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