I am sure there are some of you still in front of your computer still finalising tax returns. Dont worry you still have over 4 hours left. Plenty of time to knock out another dozen.
Submitted my last 4 today.
Have a total of 53 clients that am responsible for submitting tax returns for and only a week or so ago had over 20 still to submit.
One on my list still to be filed but client says they will do themselves. Did not bad to only have 4 estimated returns submitted in total (2 yesterday and 2 more today).
What will i do with all this free time now?
Oh i know, catch up on what I should have done in the last couple of months!!!!!!!!!!
Was a bit naughty in that didnt leave my return to last (though only did on Tuesday when I had a spare hour between client meetings).
Seventy five done here. Still have four outstanding - one who hasn't yet given me her UTR, one who hasn't yet received her UTR from HMRC (although we've paid the tax due using her NINO and HMRC have said there should be no fine), one whose submission date is 31 March and, finally, one who has promised HMRC that we'll submit 2010/11 by mid February and 2011/12 by end February.
Had a lovely afternoon raising invoices. Now, what sort of new motorbike shall I buy?!
I got my final one away by 6pm and that was mine. Again, I promise to do it earlier next year. Had a fright when my software kept saying it couldn't connect to the HMRC server, but luckily only lasted a few minutes.
..... Had a lovely afternoon raising invoices. Now, what sort of new motorbike shall I buy?!
Woman after my own heart. I have been thinking the same.
I have the "can lead a horse to water...." syndrome with four of my clients. Got them all filed in plenty of time and was checking through them on my HMRC client list last night to belt & braces everything, only to find that some still hadn't paid, even after all the reminders and hand holding I gave them. I sent reminders but knowing the clients, they still will not have paid
unless it was late because of the Santander failure in which case they will not be pursuing it... Now less than honest people might say that they tried to pay it but they couldn't... Of course, we're not like that.
Whether they pursue anyone this year who made payment on the 1st I just don't know because is it worth their trouble to try and differentiate between those who paid late full stop and those who tried to pay but couldn't.
Main thing though is that you got your return filed in time so at least no automatic £100 penalty.
keep us informed as to whether you get charged interest but to be honest, this year only because of the last minute problems at their end personally I'm actually doubting whether the interest will be applied.
__________________
Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
I'm questioning to see if i'm out of date but it seems clear that Late payment interest is in addition to penalties.
I think the interest rate is 3% at the moment but the Surcharge would kick in at an additional 5% if there was still any 11/12 tax outstanding on 1st Feb. So if he owed £5k for a week he'd be looking at forking out £2.87.
I've spoken to a Revenue officer about interest being labeled a penalty in Revenue correspondence, so it may be that they continue to do this. But I was always taught that interest, default surcharges etc were 'commercial restitution'. That is, rectifying the fact that a taxpayer had use of the money for a time and is therefore no worse off than if he had paid on time.
Regards, Tim
-- Edited by Don Tax on Saturday 2nd of February 2013 10:45:56 AM
Murky waters but the two are under different sections of FA because they have differing purposes. A penalty is a punishment. Interest would have to be charged at an exhorbitant rate to be a penalty. A loan or HP agreement might be more punishing than the overdue interest percentage.
It can be important to distinguish between a penalty and commercial restitution because interest * can be an allowable deduction. Its charged on a daily basis because the going rate for borrowing could change, thus the value of having the use of the money.
It's not me it's my boss. For some reason he held off, I mentioned that he was now late and he instructed me to pay it. I shall let you know if he incurs a penalty.
I think the interest rate is 3% at the moment but the Surcharge would kick in at an additional 5% if there was still any 11/12 tax outstanding on 1st Feb.
Interest on late payment of tax is 3% on a yearly basis.
5% penalty if 30 days late
further 5% penalty if 6 months late
further 5% penalty if 12 months late
So therefore if pay tax for 2011/12 on 31 January 2014 (12 months after due date of 31 January 2013) then will have to pay additional 18% as interest/penalty.
One of my clients (one of the currrent non payers) decided he would reduce his payment on account for 2011-2012 to nil by contacting HMRC himself, without letting me know. I only found out a few months ago when I was checking my clients status.
Anyway this year he did have tax to pay (albeit a small amount) and withing days of me filing his return interest was added to his account.
I recently had cause to speak to HMRC regarding a clients under payment, and the lady told me that as soon as any overdue payment is processed any penalties are automatically generated, without human intervention. I am guessing they must have an override facility for late payments if it is their fault
I finished by last one at 11.50pm on 31st. That was after a week of working till 1am every day!
All in all approx 140 done, with 16 I think it was that weren't done due to information not being supplied. It definately seemed that everyone left it till really late to provide their info. This year we are going to be offering early bird discounts to try and get a lot out of the way for summer. If it's anything like the last couple of years then the 140 just done will multiply into 200 this year and if they all leave it till winter then I'll have to give up sleeping altogether!!
__________________
Jenny
Responses are my opinion based on the information provided. All information should be thoroughly checked before being relied on.
I lost mine last year due to a hiccup at the exchange and even without having your work in the cloud you realise just how dependant you are on the liks of Google and the HMRC website and of course your contact with the people on here.
What are you using to write on here today? Have you got something like an internet phone as backup?
My backup now is having seperate lines / providers for the home and office systems but I really should sort out moving to a tablet phone as well... Nothing quite like having belt and braces. (or in my case, two belts and braces).
kind regards,
Shaun.
__________________
Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
......................I really should sort out moving to a tablet phone as well... Nothing quite like having belt and braces. (or in my case, two belts and braces).
kind regards,
Shaun.
I can recomend Samsung Galaxy Note (I have Note I, so can't say about Note II). A bit wide & tall but very slim, and the screen is really big (handy for the rapidly diminishing focus of eyes ). web browsing is easy, and the phone touch pad is big for the larger hand (about the size of those really big telephone keypads old people use, well alsmost )
I made mine a bit bigger by having it armour plated, with an Otterbox 3 layer cover and seperate belt clip come desk stand.
I do sometimes get the impression that I am slowly adopting your entire setup. First it was VT, then Vonage... Begining to think that maybe you should simply publish your full list of kit and all bookkeepers simply adopt that as the essential professional bookkeeper starter kit. lol.
Thanks for the advice matey, another one to slap on my to do list,
kind regards,
Shaun.
__________________
Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
My next move is going paperless (yes really). I have been looking into the various document managemenmt software out there, and am seriously considering it.
I am finding it harder and harder to keep track of paper trails, and even using MS it is easy to "lose" a file.
I am trialing a product called Dokmee at the moment, which tags the document in an SQL data base. Have had a real problem with the trial download though (my fault - if at first you dont succeed, read the friggin' instructions.Doh) I seem to have lost the link with the data base on my main PC. Manage to gett it onto my backup PC, and am figuring out how to copy the DB structure over.
Decided against Dokmee, its just too complicated. I wanted to make life easier, unfortunately, between my own cockup, and trying to learn the system from a not so helpful manual it's taking for ever.
I haven't given up on going paperless though. I will have to look at, and adapt the file structure heirachy I currently use.
I moved everything to Feng Office recently. It's an open source web based system which you can install on your own server, or a machine on your network. It includes contact management, task management, workflows, email, document management, reporting tools and clients can (if you wish) have access to items in their workspace.
It took me a while to get used to it, but it works well now. Best of all, it's free.
)
