How Making Tax Digital Will Impact Platinum
As a result of the UK government initiative known as Making Tax Digital (MTD), all UK VAT registered businesses will have to maintain digital records and electronically submit their VAT returns to HMRC from April 2019. Catalyst demonstrated our compliance with the new system to HMRC and we are on the list of software suppliers who conform to the requirements of the new system, which you can view here.
For each individual company in Platinum with its own unique VAT registration number, there will be an inbuilt link to submit VAT Returns to HMRC. Our Platinum Software can upload to HMRC for payroll, VAT100 and Making Tax Digital (MTD) online submissions. Making Tax Digital was available in Platinum release 2018-12-12.
Third-party software
If your business operates multiple companies with the same VAT registration number or uses multiple accounting systems, you have the following options. Platinum can provide custom (chargeable) reports to extract the required figures which could then be used in third-party software (Microsoft Excel) to consolidate the values together and this information could then be used to enter information for another company into a single VAT return to then be submitted manually via the HMRC Gateway.
What do you need to do?
You will need a programme update (free to those with live software maintenance) that will be available to download from the website. There is an authorisation process documented on the Platinum Knowledge Base that needs to be done as part of your first submission under the new system, but this is quick and simple to carry out. For those customers who are not submitting electronically now, it will depend on individual circumstances as to what is involved in complying with the new system, but for the majority, it should be quite straightforward. The deadline to get your company registered for MTD is November 1, 2022.
Internal processes will also need to be examined. Click here for a Knowledge base article that talks you through the VAT submission process. Not following this procedure could have an impact on VAT submissions and the year-end processes.
VAT payment deadlines
Making Tax Digital begins on your first complete VAT period starting after 1st April 2019. From this date, it will be mandatory for you to submit your tax returns digitally to HMRC.
HMRC’s standard deadline for payment of VAT is one month and seven days after the end of the VAT period. More information on deadlines is available right here.
Need more details?
To get more information on how MTD will affect your business and what actions you should take, be sure to check out these HMRC and government webpages.
Click here to view an article designed to guide you towards help and information regarding the introduction of Making Tax Digital.
Click here to find out how to authorise Platinum for Making Tax Digital.
* This article was originally written in 2018 and updated in 2024.
