As ever, the thrills and spills of England’s world cup campaign often reflect other aspects of everyday life. For example, you could say that the Government’s latest tax plan is a bit like VAR (video assistant referee) for businesses…

The Goals

For ‘Making Tax Digital’ or ‘MTD’ is all about using latest technology to make our whole tax system match fit for the 21st Century. And love it or hate it, it’s here to stay… In essence, it’s about inputting accounts information into software linking directly to HMRC on a quarterly basis.

Scheduling and Selection

The rule book opens on the first elements of the scheme from April 2019 – and affects VAT registered businesses. They will be required to submit their VAT information digitally throughout the tax year 2019/2020. From 2020, they will need to include all their other tax-relevant financial information too. All other non-VAT registered businesses and landlords must join the scheme according to a published timetable, and HMRC will blow the final whistle to make everyone compliant by April 2020.

Who’s on the Bench?

There are exceptions however: if you are a charity, if your business has a turnover of less than £10,000, or if you can make a case for being ‘digitally excluded’ i.e.you can’t use digital tools for reasons of age, disability, remoteness from broadband etc. you’ll be able to continue with your current system, and not comply with making tax digitial.

Training

The roll out of the scheme was actually delayed to give businesses plenty of time to adapt to the changes, and the team at Afford Bond is perfectly placed to start coaching you now – so you can avoid any red cards from HMRC…

Explained Afford Bond Partner Paul Edwards: “Several of our clients have been concerned about the scope and speed at which they might be expected to comply with MTD: but VAT already requires quarterly returns, so during this initial phase, no business will need to provide information to HMRC any more regularly than they do now.

“In the long run, making your reporting systems digital will help streamline your business and its profitability – but clearly, MTD can be more complicated than the Arsenal offside trap if you try and strike out on your own…”

So, if you need a tax-savvy equivalent of Gareth Southgate to ensure you don’t get any penalties from HMRC, why not get in touch with our very own Paul Edwards – with his expertise, he’ll be able to level the playing field!

Email – Paul.Edwards@affordbond.com or use the Contact Us form here on our website.