How many years accounts to keep

Pennywise

Don't forget it can be to your advantage to keep records as long as you can, and certainly longer than HMRC say you need to keep them for.

If HMRC do open an enquiry, and if they find issues in the last year or two, they have every right to go right back to earlier years. If you've not kept your paperwork, you have no way of defending yourself.

Also, there are documents you should keep for far longer for other reasons, such as purchase invoices for assets, leases, loan agreements, etc. If you buy a property, you need to keep the original solicitors completion statements etc., for the mortgage, surveyors reports, etc., and all invoices to cover money you've spent on renovating/improving it, all of which come in handy when you come to sell it, 10,20 30 years later.

Keeping invoices for equipment has certainly come in handy for me. There've been a few things that have proved faulty (design issues) long after the 2/6 year HMRC deadline, when I've successfully made claims for replacement/refund simply because I could prove my purchase!

Far better to get into the habit of "weeding" rather than throwing everything out. You can safely bin, probably 80% of the paperwork for small irrelevant stuff (using the old 80/20 rule), but should really go through it and pick out the important/big stuff to keep indefinitely.

PlutoinCapricorn

Some posters have reported being asked by the DWP to pay back some old loan that they barely remember taking out many years ago. They feel sure it was paid off, but have no records. Others have mentioned needing evidence that they worked for a particular company, others information for insurance companies.

I agree that some very important papers should never be discarded. As six years' worth of self-employment records fit into one plastic filing box, I scan and shred the oldest year each April.