Taxfile Autumn Newsletter Now Available

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Taxfile Newsletter Autumn 2014Download our jam-packed Autumn Newsletter right here for up-to-the-minute news, ways to save money, tips, new developments and tax information from Taxfile. Includes important news regarding tax return deadlines, refunds for C.I.S. sub-contractors working in the construction industry, key dates, ways to save money, HMRC tax news for landlords, imminent price changes plus an interesting mind map showing information about our lovely multi-lingual staff! Download the newsletter here (Acrobat PDF format – right-click to save the PDF to your hard drive then open it in Acrobat Reader or alternatively left-click the link to view the newsletter directly in most browsers).

Email Scam Warning in run-up to HMRC Tax Credits Deadline

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Phishing scamsHMRC have sent out warnings over a significant threat from new ‘phishing’ emails purporting to be from them. They are, in fact, scam emails which include links to replicas of the HMRC site and are designed to trick people into disclosing security-sensitive financial and personal information such as bank details, National Insurance numbers, credit card details, passwords, mother’s maiden names and so on. In the wrong hands these details could mean theft of your money or even your identity. Many people do not realise they have been scammed until it’s too late so taxpayers need to stay alert when checking emails and browsing online.

HMRC state that they never ask for payment and personal information by email and also warned people to be very wary of opening email attachments as many contain malicious code of one form or another. This is especially difficult because some of the fraudulent emails look very genuine, even appearing on casual inspection to come from an email address like taxreturns@hmrc.gov.uk and containing promises of tax refunds or Read more

It’s official: thousands are on the wrong tax code!

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With the tax return deadline being only hours away (midnight 31 January 2014) there is still time to get professional help if you need it – particularly because HMRC  often get it wrong according to new research by UHY Hacker Young.

In just one example, HMRC sent a tax bill to a pensioner which demanded over £576k in tax! With an income of only £11k per annum this was clearly incorrect but what if it had been only hundreds of pounds wrong – would the pensioner have noticed and, if so, would he have been confident enough to question it with the might of HMRC?

According to the research, HMRC employees have been making ‘basic’ errors which have led to problems such as people being on the wrong tax code and consequently underpaying or overpaying tax. While underpaying it may sound attractive on the face of it, chances are the system will catch up and then a correction will need to be made later on, leaving the taxpayer with an unforeseen bill to pay – a real blow for cashflow.

While the UHY Hacker Young research cites an error rate in 2013 of 37% in the sample tested, HMRC are arguing that the research is wrong and that their PAYE coding notices are 99% accurate. Either way, when you consider that Read more

Tax return help 7 days a week!

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By midnight on 31st January 2014, you will need to have submitted your self-assessment tax return to HMRC and have paid them any tax due for the 2012-13 financial year. It doesn’t matter if you have zero tax to pay – you still need to submit your tax return on time or you will be hit with an automatic penalty of £100 (delaying even further can, in the worst case scenario, increase this fine to as much as £1,600).

In view of this, for the month of January you can get help 7 days a week from Taxfile in Tulse Hill, South London.

Our team of tax advisers and accountants can help you with your return whatever your employment status. We can help you register with HMRC if you are not already registered, check your form and help fill it in where necessary, make sure you’ve claimed for any allowable expenses to offset tax, make sure you haven’t missed anything or claimed for something you shouldn’t have claimed, compute any tax due (or due to be refunded), and submit your tax return on-line (the only option available this late into January – paper returns are already too late!). Read more

31st October Deadline

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If you would like to send your tax return for the year ended on 5th April 2009 by paper, you would have to do it by the end of this month.

Very important to remember is that the tax return has to reach HM Revenue & Customs by Saturday 31st October.

If you send your return on paper the HMRC will calculate the tax liability to be paid or owed.

If the paper return arrives after this deadline you will be charged a £100 penalty.

According to HMRC, if you miss the deadline because of the postal strike you would not be liable for paying the £100 penalty as long as you post the return before the 31st October.

If you hand deliver your return on the 2nd of November, no penalty would be due either.

In case you miss the deadline you can always send your return online.

At Taxfile in Tulse Hill we submit all the returns online as it is safer and more secure, tax returns are processed faster, and there are later deadlines to meet.

London Employers – beat the 19 May deadline!

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Employer annual returns filing deadlineIf you are one of London’s 165,000 employers, you only have a matter of days to meet the deadline for filing your Employer Annual Returns — the deadline is 19 May! Miss it and you could end up with a costly penalty for filing late.

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) also requires large employers (that’s those employing 50 or more people) to file their 2008/2009 Employer Annual Return online. Again, if they don’t, they may well end up having to pay an additional penalty.

If you have less than 50 employees you do not have to use the system but there is a good incentive to do so anyway, in the shape of a £75 payment – tax-free!

Further information from HMRC is available although if you would prefer to have some personal help from South London-based accountants Taxfile, then they know the system extremely well and can make sure everthing is done correctly for you, and on time. Be quick though …. the 19 May deadline is ony a few days away at time of writing.

Taxfile can be contacted on 020 8761 8000 and it may help to know that many different languages are spoken.

Taxfile: 31st October 2008 deadline

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The deadline for submitting the details of your income and gains on your Self Assessment Tax Return is still the 31st January. However HMRC has now brought in place a new “paper form” deadline this year to go with the new-style green forms, the final day for submission of these is 31st October.

Almost all tax returns can be submitted online,but there are a few cases where paper returns would need to be made. In these cases the deadline by which the paper return must reach HMRC is 31st January. These are:
•SA700 – Non-resident Company Tax Return
•SA970 – Trustees of Registered Pension Schemes
Paper returns that have failed to reach HMRC by 31st October will automatically be penalized with a £100 fine.
This is the same for partnership returns, although both partners will have to pay £100 each, and Late Trust and Estate returns result in a £100 charge to either the trust or estate.
If you still haven’t paid the balancing payment due by 31 January by the end of February, you’ll be charged an automatic 5% surcharge on top of the amount still owing. This is in addition to any interest payments.
At Taxfile we only submit your current tax return online as it has proved to be safer, faster and giving you more time.
At Taxfile we have been completing online returns for some time now, this benefiting our clients as they are able to gain extra time to gather all the necessary information to complete their tax returns.
If you have not submitted your tax return yet, come to Taxfile‘s offices in either South London or Exeter to ensure that you do not receive an automatic penalty of £100.

Revenue Determinations

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Under Self Assessment, taxpayers are required to file their tax return by a certain filing date. If they fail to do so they face the risk of having the HMRC determine their tax liability by raising a so called Revenue Determination.
The Revenue Determination is meant to encourage the taxpayer to send in his/her return to the HMRC by estimating the taxpayer’s tax liability.
Once a Revenue Determination charge has been added to the taxpayer’s Self-Assessment record a notice known as ‘Determination of tax due’ will be issued to the taxpayer and his/her agent.

A Revenue Determination will automatically involve any payments on account for the following tax year. Also, where Revenue Determination and any overdue payment on account remains unpaid, interest and surcharge will be added to the taxpayer’s record.

There is no right of appeal against a Revenue Determination but the submission of the completed tax return will take the place of the Determination and the determined amount of tax will be automatically amended to the return amount. Any related interest, surcharge and payments on account will also be automatically amended.

A Revenue Determination must always be raised for an amount equal to or greater than the previous or last year’s liability, and include where necessary an appropriate percentage addition to the previous year figure.
Very important to know is that Determinations can only be raised within 5 years from the filing date.
Taxpayers can displace the determination with their own self assessment at any time up to the fifth anniversary of the filing date for the year of assessment in question (or one year after the determination was issued, if later). After five years things become a little bit more difficult as a certain concept may need to be applied, that of equitable liability.
In order to avoid having to deal with a Revenue Determinations, self-assessment taxpayers need to make sure that they are familiar with the filing deadlines and seek help from tax companies like Taxfile when sending their tax return , especially now with a new 31st October paper return deadline in place.