HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) may waive penalties for businesses who file late corporation tax returns as a result of Covid-19 disruption, it has been revealed.<\/p>\n
Late corporation tax returns usually attract an automatic penalty fine, increasing the later the return is filed.<\/p>\n
However, HMRC has the discretion to waive penalties for late submission where there is a \u201creasonable excuse\u201d.<\/p>\n
And according to the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), Covid-19 disruption and related delays may be included in this directive.<\/p>\n
The report comes after an email exchange between the accounting regulator and HMRC, during which the tax office confirmed that \u201cwhere a tax return filing date has not yet passed and a company is having difficulty filing its return on time, it can get in touch with HMRC to request deferral of a late filing penalty\u201d.<\/p>\n
This aligns with the new Companies House policy, which has extended the deadline for filing accounts that were due to be filed between 27 June 2020 and 5 April 2021 for up to nine months.<\/p>\n
Corporation tax returns must be accompanied by a signed set of company accounts, so complementary late filing policies will be welcomed.<\/p>\n
Commenting on the report, the ICAEW said: \u201cICAEW\u2019s Tax Faculty has heard from one member that where the accounts filing has been delayed an informal one-month filing extension for tax return filing would be granted by HMRC where requested.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis would need to be applied for within the two weeks before the normal deadline \u2013 so between 17 and 31 December 2020 for a limited company with a 31 December 2019 year end.\u201d<\/p>\n
The regulator added: \u201cICAEW\u2019s Tax Faculty reminds members that where companies have incurred other forms of difficulties in filing their corporation tax returns, which might be a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, they may request a deferral on the basis that they have a \u2018reasonable excuse\u2019 for late filing.\u201d<\/p>\n
For help and advice on related issues, please get in touch with our expert team today.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) may waive penalties for businesses who file late corporation tax returns as a result of Covid-19 disruption, it has been revealed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3852,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3850"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3850"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3850\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3851,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3850\/revisions\/3851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}