With Christmas over for another year, that can only mean one thing: it’s officially the month of renewed gym memberships, committing to healthy diets and swearing off alcohol. And while it’s all well and good to counter the sins of the festive break, it does mean we’re all secretly counting down the days until January is over.
But January 31st doesn’t just mark the end of Dry Jan (phew!), for all self-employed individuals, it also marks the deadline for self-assessment filing. Miss this deadline and you’ll be automatically fined £100 by HMRC, not exactly the best start to the new year…
Didn’t get the filing memo? Not to worry, there’s still plenty of time ahead of the deadline to rectify. At Baa, we offer one-off filing services for exactly these situations. With our experienced team and express filing services, we’re here to help you get your paperwork organised and filed on time.
Read on to find out how we can help if you’re up against the clock.
What is self-assessment
SeIf you’re self-employed, it’s more than likely you’ll already be familiar with self-assessments, but here’s a quick rundown for the newbies:
A Self-Assessment Tax Return (SATR) is the system used by HMRC to collect tax from individuals whose income isn’t taxed at the source (e.g. by an employer or client). When self-employed, the responsibility to calculate and report income and tax owed falls to you.
Need more information about how to register for a self-assessment tax return, what filing involves, and how to avoid penalties? Check out some of our most recent blogs here:
Top 10 Self-assessment Filing Mistakes and How to Overcome Them
Filing Small Business Taxes for the First Time
Self-assessment filing deadlines
Here’s a summary of the all-important filing deadlines:
- October 5th: deadline to register to file
- October 31st: deadline to submit paper returns
- January 31st: deadline to submit online returns and pay taxes
As you can see, the deadline to register to file for this round of self-assessments has already passed. However, if you forgot to register, it’s better to do it late and get your taxes filed than to not do it at all. Neglecting your tax duties is a sure way to wind up in trouble with HMRC further down the line, plus you’ll be looking at forking out for some hefty fines too.
Penalties for late filing
There’s a range of reasons HMRC sees fit to dish out penalties when it comes to self-assessments. In the majority of cases, if you’ve taken due diligence to fill out your return with care, you have nothing to worry about when it comes to fines. It’s normally outright neglect and consistent inaccuracies that can cause issues. As such, the following acts could land you with a penalty:
- Missing the deadline for submitting your tax return (31st October for paper, 31st January for online)
- Missing the deadline for paying your tax return bill (31st January)
- Sending an inaccurate return
- Failure to keep adequate records
For more on late filing penalties and how to avoid them, read our Self-Assessment Tax Return Gone Wrong blog here.
One-off filing services
Employing the help of a qualified accountant when you’re behind with your self-assessment tax return is a great idea. Not only are accountants equipped to deal with handling and digesting large volumes of documents in a short amount of time, but they are also well-versed in complex tax laws and legislation.
At Baa, we understand that no two businesses are the same, and that means that no two tax returns are the same either. Throughout our 15 years in the industry, we’ve looked after a myriad of self-employed individuals – ranging from sole traders to freelancers to CIS workers and beyond – so believe us when we say we understand that running a business is hard and takes a lot of resilience, patience, and time-management. When you’re being pulled in several different directions daily, organising your taxes often isn’t number one on the priority list. It’s easy to see how filing can be left to the very last minute.
Our fixed-fee year-end accounting service is therefore the perfect way to reduce your workload and ensure that you get everything submitted on time.
All we’ll need from you is your personal details, basic income details, and your UTR number. Once we have that, we can start calculating the figures and have your documents ready for uploading to HMRC in no time!
Missed the filing deadline?
If you’re reading this blog and it’s already past January 31st, there’s no need to worry just yet. Though you will have received an automatic £100 fine from HMRC, there’s no reason as to why this sum should keep increasing as long as you get filing sooner rather than later.
With a whopping 48-hour turnaround, Baa’s express filing service is a one-off tax return service designed to get your self-assessment filed as soon as possible and prevent you from incurring a larger fine. What’re you waiting for? There’s no time like the present!
Get in touch
Want to know more about self-assessments and how our accountants can help with your filing needs? Get in touch with the team today.
