Self Employed claiming tax back/defer

Ship

I wonder if anyone can help me.

I am due to enter a self employed tax return for 2006-2007 in which I will have tax to pay as I made a profit.

However so far this year 2007-2008 my business has made a loss.
2 questions:

Can I reduce the amount of tax paid in my 2006-2007 return based on the fact I am making a loss so far this year?

Can I defer the payments on account for 2007-2008? If so will I need to do this in good time to get authorisation from the tax office or will it just deduct automatically? I submit my returns online.

I'd appreciate any guidance.

Thanks

fengirl_2

To answer the other part of your question, yes you can defer your POA's for 07/08 - you enter this on your SA. Your SA is due in on the day your POA is due, so the two will tie up eventually.

Ship

Thanks jimmo & fengirl,

Presumably jimmo if I have still made a loss on April 5th 2008 I can file a tax return immediately and caim back some of the tax paid in January?

Murdina

just one thing about reducing your 07 08 POAs. If you reduce them by too much you will pay interest back to the due dates for the original payments on account. So do be sure you estimate your losses as accurately as possible and do your sums as carefully as possible. You can amend POAs at any time using (if memory serves me right) form SA 303 which is downloadable from HMRC website. You can amend as often as you need to eg if you think you've gone too low, you can alter them again.
And yes the sooner you file your 2008 return, the sooner the losses will be offset and any overpaid tax repaid.

Ship

Thankyou Murdina