I haven't paid tax for around 4 years

Volcom94

Nothing on payslips about income tax being paid, I set up a government gateway account yesterday, can't see anything about tax, it just mentions that there's 6 years where I haven't paid enough national insurance. That's a shame about your situation, last thing I need is debt collectors at my door. I know I've been stupid but all I want to do is pay off what I owe and never go self employed again! Thanks for the help.

HonourlessWeasel

Volcom94 wrote: »

Nothing on payslips about income tax being paid, I set up a government gateway account yesterday, can't see anything about tax, it just mentions that there's 6 years where I haven't paid enough national insurance. That's a shame about your situation, last thing I need is debt collectors at my door. I know I've been stupid but all I want to do is pay off what I owe and never go self employed again! Thanks for the help.

If you're young enough, or at some point in the not too distant future, you might be able to make up the shortfall in your NI contributions in one lump sum payment. I'd say it's worth doing, because if you don't then it has a serious impact on your state pension. There will come a point when they don't allow you to make up the shortfall, so you're stuck living on whatever level of contributions you to get by about the age of 50 or 55 and that could be the bare minimum.

That's a question worth asking when you get in touch with HMRC. The NI contributions are something you would have been paying if you'd set up your own limited company or registered yourself as a sole trader/self employed. They're a whole other world of pain that I've been through with HMRC, but certainly worth getting right and getting proper advice about.

decbel

With NI contributions if there's a shortfall for a few years they normally send you a letter giving you an option to square up.

I had one once.

McKneff

Volcom94 wrote: »

Nothing on payslips about income tax being paid, I set up a government gateway account yesterday, can't see anything about tax, it just mentions that there's 6 years where I haven't paid enough national insurance. That's a shame about your situation, last thing I need is debt collectors at my door. I know I've been stupid but all I want to do is pay off what I owe and never go self employed again! Thanks for the help.

Nothing wrong with going self employed as long as you register and keep records.
And take a course on book keeping lol

Volcom94

Thanks, it's just I was only "self employed" or on commission because that's what they do at that company. Now that I want to permanently live in Norwich, I just want to get my taxes in order and let my future employer do that work!

xylophone

I am not sure that you were "self employed" - it seems to me that you were an employee of the companies in question and that they should have operated PAYE/NI as appropriate.

https://www.gov.uk/employment-status/worker

Have you obtained a state pension statement?

https://www.gov.uk/check-state-pension

Volcom94

Certainly no PAYE operated, just a case of give us your bank details and we'll pay you. As I say, I've never paid a penny in tax since I started working at these companies, nor have I set myself up as self employed. So as far as the government are concerned, I haven't been working for the last 4 or so years. So now this has really come back to bite me on the a***

00ec25

Volcom94 wrote: »

Certainly no PAYE operated, just a case of give us your bank details and we'll pay you. As I say, I've never paid a penny in tax since I started working at these companies, nor have I set myself up as self employed. So as far as the government are concerned, I haven't been working for the last 4 or so years. So now this has really come back to bite me on the a***

Ok, so it appears you worked on a commission only basis and were not paid anything if you did not sell something.

commission only is actually a pretty strong indicator of self employment status rather than employee status. It would of course help a great deal more if you can produce a contract setting out the terms of the agreement between yourself and the 2 companies. and technically you should have invoiced the company for your commission, but this is a minor issue now.
http://www.millerrosenfalck.com/2009/05/employee-or-self-employed-hmrc’s-approach-to-employment-status/

sticking with the assumption you were self employed, you will need:
- evidence of all income received over the 4 year period. Not just what they paid you but also all other income you got (interest on savings, dividends received, taxable benefits claimed eg JSA)?
- evidence of any costs you paid out which were wholly and necessarily related to the work you did. For example: itemised calls on your phone bill? mileage undertaken when visiting prospective customers? stationery you purchased? extra lighting and heating because you were working from home during the day?

you will then need to work out your profits for each tax year and obviously submit the tax return. You will then need to deal with HMRC when they impose penalties and interest for late submission.

if your income was really "only" around £13k it may be rather expensive for you to use an accountant, but in the circumstances I think it would be the most sensible option as there is a lot of info that needs to be presented correctly in case HMRC examine you in detail. sadly that won't come cheap and may cost you > £1,000 for an accountant so dig out and summarise any and every bit of info you can find so the accountant is not having to spend time (at your cost) on doing that them self. Pick wisely, can you get anyone to give local recommendations on accountants round your way?

Volcom94

Just an update for you all 9 months on, I got an accountant who very kindly did all of my tax returns since 2013/14 all the way through to 2016/17 for £480. Not a bad price considering how much they told me I'd usually be charged.

I submitted this all to HMRC, and they allowed me to pay this off in instalments, with only £6 interest in total for all those years! I was quite lucky really. Won't be making that mistake next time.

Paul_DNAP

That is a good result for you, nice one, always good to be square on these things.
Did you have a discussion about the missing NI contributions also, you should be able to make them up with voluntary contributions as it's less than six years ago.