MTD - Soletrader - Stress

sidneyyoungblood

I am a non vat registered sole trader selling online mostly on ebay and by website  - all my sales go through a Starling business account . 

I usually fill in a spreadsheet with all my sales / expenses and at the end of the year pass it on to my accountant who looks over all the files and submits them for me   . 

Come April I have to use MTD and not too sure what to do , the HRMC website is confusing and doee not give any real help or software recommendations . 

How do you go about submitting the files - will it include my mileage log - expenses etc .. Getting a bit stressed about it .

I do not really want to pay my accountant £250 per quarter ( instead of per year ) just to look over the files .  Any help or software recommendations would be appreciated.

Isthisforreal99

Is your turnover high enough to mean you are included in MTD now?

HMRC view will be that if you are capable of running an online business turniing over more than £50k then you should be capable of navigating MTD and if you cant you will need to pay someone to do it.

LITRG

Hello, a good starting point would be to read our guidance - aimed at taxpayers exactly in your situation! It brings together the main points in one place and lists some software considerations. Hope it helps: https://www.litrg.org.uk/tax-nic/how-tax-collected/making-tax-digital-income-tax

uknick

Has your accountant quoted for the extra work?  All HMRC are asking for each quarter is a figure for income and a figure for expenses.  They dropped the requirement for a detailed income /expenditure submission some time ago.

SVaz

Just use something like Freeagent software.
It auto fills your tax return as you go along,  you link it to your bank feed / Paypal and hmrc account.
I get it free with Mettle but it’s cheap enough if you need to pay. 

sidneyyoungblood

SVaz said:

Just use something like Freeagent software.
It auto fills your tax return as you go along,  you link it to your bank feed / Paypal and hmrc account.
I get it free with Mettle but it’s cheap enough if you need to pay. 

Thanks will look into it , can get it for 12 months for around £100 on discount or maybe swich bank accounts from starling then free.. How have you found them as a business bank - no additional fees which is the reason I ended up leaving natwest as the transaction fees were costing me alot?

sidneyyoungblood

Just an update - just received the letter from HRMC stating that I do need to submit using MTD from April.

I am with Starling Bank which does not offer any free software ,

Could I open Mettle account to get access to the free freeagent software and still have have the starling account ? .

The other option is just to use the free version of Clearbooks .

Mistral001

Have you discussed this with your accountant? HMRC cannot recommend software as it has to be independent and cannot advertise software, however accountants should have no such restraints and be able to suggest software that will be MTD compliant.

sidneyyoungblood

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81879811#Comment_81879811

My accountant said just to wait until there is more information available .. I just would like to get my head around the software before april..

uknick

If you have an accountant who does your year end accounts, why would he not do your MTD submissions? Which is why I asked initially how much would he charge for the service.

With regard to free software, HSBC are now going to provide an MTD service. I'm sure other banks will be along soon.

Get Ready for Making Tax Digital – Your Guide to Business

sidneyyoungblood

Thanks again ,

Starling has announced that they will be offering free MTD , not in place yet but looks to be free for soletraders.

Free Making Tax Digital Software | Starling