Newsletter November 2017

Simple Tax Assessment: ending of the tax return

HMRC is starting to rely on information they can obtain elsewhere to remove customers from the Tax Return system. The process will start by focussing on new state pensioners and PAYE customers.

As part of the Making Tax Digital agenda, HMRC are going to use the information they received from other sources to reduce the number of individuals that must submit a Tax Return:

• New state pensioners within income exceeding the personal allowance will be removed from Self-Assessment from September 2017.
• PAYE taxpayers who have underpaid tax which cannot be collected through their tax code will also be removed from Self-Assessment.
• All state pensioners who complete a tax return because their state pension is more than their personal allowance will be removed from Self-Assessment in 2018/19.

HMRC will use the information they already hold and calculate any tax payable:

• HMRC will begin writing to taxpayers with a tax calculation instead of requesting a tax return.
• Taxpayers must check the information is correct and pay the tax by the deadline specified.
• A taxpayer will have 60 days to contact HMRC if they believe some of the information is incorrect.

This will currently be used only in the simplest of cases, but will be rolled out to more complicated cases alongside the planned improvements to the personal tax account.