HMRC to charge £100 fine for late filing – even if you don’t owe any tax!

For the first time, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) will impose automatic fines of £100 on individuals who fail to meet the 31 January deadline who do not owe any tax and may even be due a refund.

Furthermore, additional penalties may accrue starting from 1 May 2012, which could lead to an individual being fined £1,300 on 1 August for not filing a tax return even if that proves they do not, in fact, owe any tax. Meanwhile, those who do owe tax could be fined up to 100% of the tax due if they file their return 12 months late, in addition to incurring penalties of up to £1,300.

Andrew Shaw, Head of Personal Tax at Kingston Smith LLP, the top 20 accountancy firm, urges: “There is a fixed penalty of £100 for filing a personal tax return late, even if you don’t owe HMRC a penny, so don’t let yourself get caught out – make sure you file your tax return early.”

On 31 January last year, 572,000 Tax Returns were filed online (of a total of 6.9m), with almost 50,000 filed in the hour from 4pm to 5pm.

Taxpayers have until midnight on 31 January to file their tax returns online. However, those who are new to online filing will first need to register for HMRC’s online services, the deadline for which is Saturday 21 January.

Shaw explains: “Once registered, you will be sent a code to activate your account. This is sent to your home address and may take up to seven working days to arrive. So it is important to register as soon as possible.

“To register, you will need your Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR) and either your postcode or National Insurance number,” Shaw continues. “Your UTR can be found on your correspondence from HMRC; otherwise you will need to request it from your Tax Office. However, it can only be sent to your home address via post, so again, you will need to factor this in.”

For more information on filing self-assessment tax returns online, visit:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/sa/understand-online.htm