Not registered as self employed

A student loan is not income so sounds like you are below all the thresholds for registration and payment of tax.

Rhi97 wrote: »

In the past my earnings have been below the class 2 NIC threshold but this year I think it's likely to go over so I probably do need to register now right?

And if I do register now do I need to put the date I actually started my business or just the start of this year when I started making enough to need to register?

I'm going to disagree with the above, personal allowance has no bearing on whether you need to notify HMRC because if you are self employed and earning more than £1000 in revenue (not profit), then you are required to register for self assessment. Although I'd also stress having to file a tax return doesn't mean you'll be liable to pay anything.

I'd also caution against being dishonest. Thats a slippery slope that is 20 years long - which is how long you can be held liable if you did it deliberately (ie more than just careless). Especially risky when you're not operating on a cash only basis (in other words, paper trail through bank accounts etc).

Remember and tell them if you stop. They'll keep expecting returns from you until you inform them otherwise.

Under what legislation is there a statutory requirement to notify HMRC that you are self-employed if your earnings are below the class 2 NIC threshold and personal allowance? What would the penalty for failure to notify be for somebody who owes neither of the above?

Just because some HMRC guidance somewhere says you must register for self-employment, it doesn't mean this is the law. For years HMRC said that you needed to register for self-assessment if you were a company director. This had no basis in law either.

If a taxpayer is not already in self-assessment and does not receive a notice to file a tax return, then they do not have an obligation to file a tax return, they only have a liability to notify HMRC if they are chargeable to tax:

https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/self-assessment-legal-framework/salf210

As I said, you used to have to register automatically because the default position was that if you were self-employed, you were liable to pay class 2 NIC, even if you were under the threshold, unless you explicitly applied for a Small Earnings Exemption. These no longer exist as class 2 NIC is now calculated based on your earnings and collected via self-assessment. Therefore if your earnings are below the class 2 NIC threshold and for income tax purposes you are covered by any of the available allowances, then you have nothing to notify HMRC about.

I'll also point you towards HMRC's guidance on failure to notify penalties:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/807229/CC-FS11_0719.pdf

Note under examples of circumstances where you should have notified HMRC it says:

"your profits from self-employment first make you chargeable to tax - you must tell us within 6 months of the end of the relevant tax year"

Not "you first become self-employed", but "your profits...make you chargeable to tax".

Its worth mentioning however that even if you are not liable to pay class 2 NIC you may wish to register as self-employed and make voluntary contributions in order to entitle you to state benefits.

It's what the law says that matters, not what the HMRC website says. HMRC have form for making up rules to suit them that have no basis in law. Like another poster has said above, they spent years saying directors "must" register and submit SA returns, despite there being no actual law to say that. Registration for SA for self employment is exactly the same situation - there is no LAW requiring it if there is no tax nor NIC liability.