UnderOpenSky
baseline neural therapy
fffffffffffffuuuuck I'm getting over a grand of overpaid tax back!!
I should have filled this out earlier
I got similar last month.
Post your tax return angst here
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I got similar last month.
Leafster
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If you're self-employed you would need to add up all your income and expenses over a fixed period of time. The end of that fixed period of time is the "date your books or accounts are made up to". If you've been self-employed for some time you'll usually draw up Accounts or summarise your income and expenses to the same date each year (usually annually) and then start afresh for a new year so you'll have a summary of 12 months' worth of income and expenses.
If you're new to self-employment the easiest thing to do is draw up your accounts to 5th April each year. This may mean that the first period will often be shorter than 12 months. In this case you'd add up your self-employed income from the date you started to trade until 5th April and then do the same with the expenses and your Accounts would be made up to 5th April.
ska invita
back on the other side
Just googled this same question and this page is top of google
(well, second to an old HMRC pdf)
Leafster
.
I suspect the references to "the date your books or accounts are made up to" will disappear from the 2024 Tax Return as they are doing away with basis periods and you'll need to report your income and expenses for the tax year (if you're self-employed). It's all to do with Making Tax Digital (MTD) and MTD for Income Tax is due to come into effect in the 2023/2024 tax year.Just googled this same question and this page is top of google
StoneRoad
heckling from the back!
G-d, I hate HMRC.
Been paying PAYE & VAT over on a fairly regular schedule, but as allowed some of this has been "in arrears", partly because their stupid on-line system - or some mis-entered data - a while back got out of step with what was intended to happen.
For some reason, they [hmrc] seem totally unable to allocate payments made to the correct tax year / account.
Thus, the current year is "in credit" because of several over-payments, and a fake "debt" isn't cleared, despite paying in the funds to cover the "debt" - several times !
So, clearing a "debt" that only arose because they don't allocate correctly has taken years, plus arguing with "collection" ...
Been paying PAYE & VAT over on a fairly regular schedule, but as allowed some of this has been "in arrears", partly because their stupid on-line system - or some mis-entered data - a while back got out of step with what was intended to happen.
For some reason, they [hmrc] seem totally unable to allocate payments made to the correct tax year / account.
Thus, the current year is "in credit" because of several over-payments, and a fake "debt" isn't cleared, despite paying in the funds to cover the "debt" - several times !
So, clearing a "debt" that only arose because they don't allocate correctly has taken years, plus arguing with "collection" ...
With PAYE you should be able to use the reference that would have been on your old yellow paying in book with the suffix of 2001, 2002 etc for the tax periods 1 and 2 of the 2020-21 tax year in that example. You should be able to find the payment reference (not the PAYE reference!) by logging into the govt gateway for the relevant legal entity.
Suffix 13 for P11D
Hope that makes sense. Not sure re VAT as not my pigeon but I imagine the same principal depending on if it’s paid monthly or quarterly
Suffix 13 for P11D
Hope that makes sense. Not sure re VAT as not my pigeon but I imagine the same principal depending on if it’s paid monthly or quarterly
Leafster
.
I think the first point is that each tax has different systems within HMRC and these are dealt with by different teams of people. So, if you've accidentally made a payment for say PAYE to the VAT account then HMRC won't be able to reallocate it to the correct tax system. At least, this is the experience I've had with my clients.
If that's what's happened you will need to approach the department with the overpayment and request a repayment of the excess or ask them to reallocate it to a different liability for the same tax. You'll then need to make a payment to the correct tax account to correct the apparent underpayment.
You've only mentioned PAYE and VAT so I won't deal with Corporation Tax or Income Tax procedures.
With PAYE, as Elpenor says the references can be enhanced with the tax year/month so that HMRC can allocate the payment to a specific pay period. So, if you've put 2209 at the end, it will get allocated automatically to December 2021 (being month 9 of the PAYE year 2021/22). HMRC's PAYE systems won't automatically override this if the liability for that month doesn't match. If you don't add the period reference on the end of the PAYE payment reference then HMRC's systems will initially allocate the payment based on when they receive it. So, assuming monthly PAYE payments, HMRC's systems would automatically assume that anything paid today (24th December) would relate to December's PAYE. This is because it's after the due date for November (22nd December) and before the December due date of 22nd January 2022. In my experience, if there have been no enhanced references used and there is an earlier liability then it will eventually get allocated to the earlier liability.
If your PAYE online account shows liabilities in an earlier period and credits in a later one then the first thing to do is check that your RTI submissions are correct. Log onto your PAYE dashboard, look at the charges and credits columns and make sure they have the same information as the P30/P32 in your payroll software. You can drill down into the HMRC dashboard to identify PAYE, NI, Employment Allowance etc. Please be aware there maybe interest charges or supplements which won't appear in your payroll software unless you've manually added them. If the information (excluding interest etc) doesn't match you'll need to send a further RTI submission from your software to correct this. If the charges and credit columns match then it's a case of contacting HMRC to ask them to reallocate the payments. The Employer's Helpline is usually very good at this but you may be waiting on hold for sometime before you get to speak to someone. You'll need to have the P32 from your software and the details of any payments you've made to hand so you can explain which PAYE payments need reallocating. There's one thing I should point out. Bizarrely, the dashboard that the PAYE officer will be able to see might not match the one you can see! It can be confusing to them but they know this problem exists.
Now, onto the black hole which is VAT. Assuming you're in MTD for VAT then your MTD compliant software will have the details of the VAT Returns you've submitted. It will also draw down the payment information from HMRC. Check this payment history against the payments you think you've made by looking at your nominal/general ledger VAT account and bank account. If there are differences it may be because one or more VAT payments have been made with the wrong reference (ie to the wrong tax or an incorrect reference). With VAT payments the only reference is the VAT registration number with no indication of the VAT quarter so it should just go into the VAT "pot" so long as the correct VAT reference was used. Your bank records should show the HMRC bank account and the VAT reference used for each payment. Double-check these are correct. I have to admit my clients have rarely had problems with VAT payments. The only issues have been when they have been due refunds which haven't materialised. This usually happens because HMRC's VAT system records the bank account for payments to them (for example if you've paid by direct debit) separately from the bank account to which they would make repayments. Pre MTD for VAT this could be checked by logging onto your HMRC VAT portal and reviewing the bank details. I've not had a problem since MTD for VAT so I'm not sure how you could check this now. If all else fails phone the VAT helpline. Expect a very long wait and don't expect it to resolved in one phone call!
If you're being chased by debt collection then explain to them that you're resolving the problem with the relevant tax office. They should put a note on their files which will stop them pestering you for a while.
ETA: If you have an accountant they should be helping you with this
Griff
Hardly posting anymore
Got a cheque for just under £500 today (Merry Christmas!) which I assume is some kind of rebate for working from home in 2020. 
Remember filling in some kind of questionaire at the start of the year and completely forgot about it.
Made up for the £65 fine that also came in the post today for having my front wheels on a yellow box in Leyton.
Remember filling in some kind of questionaire at the start of the year and completely forgot about it.
Made up for the £65 fine that also came in the post today for having my front wheels on a yellow box in Leyton.
Leafster
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Yeah, most of my clients are smaller businesses so we/they don't use BACS file generation for payrolls.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Can't remember what I did last year.
"Cash Basis" is what I want right?
"Cash Basis" is what I want right?
Leafster
.
If you log into your Tax Account you should be able to download your Return for last year (I think). That "should" include a box which indicates whether you used the cash-basis then.
Whether the cash basis is the best for you, it depends!
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Oh yeah, of course I already kept last years flies on my computer. It's weird, I can't seem to remember anything of last years return, I just remember it being easy, and when I did it I remembered everything from the year before that.If you log into your Tax Account you should be able to download your Return for last year (I think). That "should" include a box which indicates whether you used the cash-basis then.
Whether the cash basis is the best for you, it depends!
equationgirl
Respect my existence or expect my resistance
I'm starting to think about doing it.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
I wish you had just bloody posted if you did or didn't use 'Cash Basis' in the end.
Now I have to look it up all over again. Can't bloody remember.
AnnaKarpik
Queen of all she surveys
Cash basis = money paid and received in the tax year, no messing about with debtors, creditors, fixed assets.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Yeah, got it. Looked at last years. It's obvious. No idea why I can never remember this stuff.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Soooo. Expenses.
Seems I bought myself a massive electric desk from Ikea for this tax year and a couple of other desky things specifically for work at home. . . I am assuming I can claim for them? . . . but the rug that I bought to put the desk on (the floor in my home office is freezing), can I claim that? Sounds a tiny bit too much to me, but not as much as a tory duck house or moat.
I also bought shelving for the work office, though it is not currently exclusively for work bits and bobs.
Seems I bought myself a massive electric desk from Ikea for this tax year and a couple of other desky things specifically for work at home. . . I am assuming I can claim for them? . . . but the rug that I bought to put the desk on (the floor in my home office is freezing), can I claim that? Sounds a tiny bit too much to me, but not as much as a tory duck house or moat.
I also bought shelving for the work office, though it is not currently exclusively for work bits and bobs.
prunus
Tick tock.
Basic rule is you can claim for things that were bought to enable and solely used for your work. It sounds like the desk and desky things could easily fall into this category (would you have bought them if it wasn't for your work? Do you use them for non-work things at all?).
Decorating/improving a home office can be claimed as a level proportionate with the amount of time it's in use for work, a rug could I think possibly fall into this category. Personally I'd not - I always err on the side of simple and clear-cut.
Shelving if used for non-work things probably can't be claimed proportionately (difficult to see it as improvement, it's an asset in my eyes).
That's how I'd see it anyway. Not got into any trouble yet.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Yes I think that's how I see it. Yes I did buy the desk only for working from home. It sits there only for that purpose (in my garden office). Carpet was also ONLY bought for work, but it just just seems wrong somehow.
AnnaKarpik
Queen of all she surveys
If your office is only ever used for work, I would claim everything you put in there that makes it useable. Then work out the office floor space as a proportion of total home space and use that calculation to claim some of your heating, power, water, council tax, rent/mortgage interest. Make a note of it all for future reference. Your calculations have to be reasonable rather than accurate to the penny.
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Meh, it probably is only ever used for work but I do keep other bits in there. I'm just going for the simple one off working from home calculation. . . . it would be waaaay too complicated to do it the proper way, especially as I am not working all the time and my wife also works from home.
What about a broken window though? My garden office had to have a £300 window fitted when I came home one day to find one of them had been smashed.
I guess I am probably going to say no. . . . In fairness only maybe one third of the garden office is actually dedicated to my 'work office'
ATOMIC SUPLEX
Member Since: 1985 Post Count: 3
Shiiiiiiitttt. I have just noticed an error on last years submission . . . I accidentally claimed £1000 more in expenses. I must have literally typed a 2 instead of a 1 at some point or something . . it is exactly £1000 wrong.
When will be the best time to tell the HMRC? I have made an adjustment to an error before. Luckily I only had to pay the interest. They will obviously have a lot of work on their hands at the moment.
When will be the best time to tell the HMRC? I have made an adjustment to an error before. Luckily I only had to pay the interest. They will obviously have a lot of work on their hands at the moment.
prunus
Tick tock.
I believe you can still amend and resubmit last years return; it will recalculate and add the missing tax and some penalties. You can then have them added to this years (there’s a section for underpaid tax I believe). I’d do it straight away if it was me.
AnnaKarpik
Queen of all she surveys
What prunus said, get it done before the 31st.
