HMRC concedes on penalties for late self-assessment
For weeks tax experts have been pressuring HMRC to scrap penalties for late filing of 2019/20 self-assessment tax returns. Until now HMRC has refused. Today it’s made a partial concession. What’s the full story?
The pressure has been mounting on HMRC and the government to give a general amnesty for taxpayers who submit their 2019/20 self-assessment tax return online later than the usual filing deadline of 31 January 2021. HMRC hasn’t gone that far but has agreed that anyone who can’t file their return by the deadline won’t receive a late filing penalty if they file online by 28 February.
In its statement, HMRC hasn’t mentioned the penalties charged for those who were late submitting their 2019/20 paper self-assessment tax return which was due by 31 October. We’ll have to wait to see if it decides to retrospectively cancel some or all of them.
The announcement doesn’t change any statutory right to have a late filing penalty canceled if the taxpayer have a reasonable excuse for submitting their tax return after the deadline. This means if anyone can’t file your return by 28 February they still have the right to appeal against the £100 penalty that HMRC will automatically issue.
Related Topics
-
Selling spare items to your company
You’re short of cash but if you use the traditional methods to take more money out of your company you’ll pay higher rate taxes. Is there another way to extract profits without paying income tax or NI?
-
No such thing as a (tax) free lunch?
You run a small consultancy company and treat your staff to lunch in the office once a week. Your bookkeeper says it’s a taxable benefit in kind because staff lunches are only exempt if they are provided in a workplace canteen. Is this correct?
-
Judge criticises use of fabricated AI-generated cases in HMRC appeal
A tax tribunal judge has criticised the use of apparently fabricated case references generated by artificial intelligence in an appeal against HMRC. The incident highlights growing concerns over the use of AI tools in legal and tax proceedings. What happened?