According to HM Revenue & Customs approximately 600,000 self-assessment tax returns for the 2021-22 tax year were not filed by the 31 January 2023 filing deadline.
Anyone who has missed the deadline will automatically be issued with a £100 late penalty notice. This has to be paid irrespective of your tax position. The penalty notices are normally issued in February to all those who missed the deadline.
If your tax return is still outstanding at 1 May 2023, a penalty of £10 per day will be charged for a maximum of 90 days. For example, if you submit your tax return on the 11 May 2023, a further penalty of £100 will be charged. This is in addition to the late filing penalty and again has to be paid even if you do not have a tax liability to settle. Being late with your tax return could prove to be very costly as further penalties are levied when the tax return has not been submitted six months after the filing deadline.
In addition, if you have a tax bill for 2021-22 which should have been paid by 31 January 2023, you will now be accruing interest on that sum, and from 2 March 2023 a penalty of 5% of the tax still outstanding will be added. It is possible to avoid this penalty (but not the interest on late paid tax) by making a formal instalment arrangement with HMRC, which can be organised online (depending on the amount due) or by telephone. However, if you have not yet submitted your tax return your tax bill will not yet have been calculated and no such arrangement will be possible.
If you are one of those individuals who still needs to submit your 2021-22 tax return, you should do so as soon as possible to avoid these further penalties being charged.
Here at Plus Accounting we will be very happy to help you with the preparation of your self-assessment tax return with our personal tax compliance service.
Author: Michelle Baldwin, Assistant Tax Manager, Plus Accounting
Any views or opinions represented in this blog are personal, belong solely to the blog owner and do not represent those of Plus Accounting. All content provided on this blog is for informational purposes only. The owner of this blog makes no representations as to the accuracy or completeness of any information on this site or found by following any link on this site.
Date Published: 15 February 2023