Making Tax Digital

Tax and Practice Management software which has MTD pre-population data live in our Solution Centre.

This section includes

MTD for Self-Assessment
MTD for Vat
MTD for Business

BTCSoftware is proud to be a very active member of the software developer community

HMRC consults as they test new functionality in Making Tax Digital (MTD)’s creation. And as these new developments are finalised, we incorporate them into our software to coincide with them becoming live at HMRC. We also have practitioners already working with the pre-population data being fed into our solutions from HMRC’s MTD pilot.

Self-Assessment Pre-Population live data

Individual Benefits

Benefit–based services, such as retrieval of benefits information.

Individual Employment

Employment–based services, such as employment history.

Individual Income

Income–based services, such as historic personal income and employment-based income.

Individual Tax

Tax–based services, such as retrieval of annual personal and employment-related tax liabilities and refunds.

Marriage Allowance

The Marriage Allowance API provides information about whether someone is claiming Marriage Allowance and checks eligibility to claim Marriage Allowance.

National Insurance

National Insurance services, such as retrieval of annual summary of Class 1 and Class 2 National Insurance contributions.

Agent Authorisation

HMRC secure agent two step authorisation.

HMRC Compliant

BTCSoftware work with the HMRC SDSTeam to deliver all new API’s as they are built and then following Beta testing they are released into our solutions.

MTD for Self-Assessment

BTCSoftware was one of the first companies to implement Making Tax Digital (MTD)-friendly features in our products. It began with our Self-assessment API (application programme interface) that enabled our users to pre-populate individual tax returns with data already held by HMRC in Digital Tax Accounts. We successfully pioneered the development and testing of this with HMRC’s Digital team. This time-saving functionally has been live in our software since 24/04/2017 and has proven invaluable to our customers when cross-checking data. Further APIs which are now live and actively integrate with HMRC’s portal are listed above.

MTD for VAT

BTCSoftware have developed a solution allowing agents to submit MTD for VAT and having done so are still working closely with HMRC’s Digital team whilst being part of their private BETA programme MTD for VAT.

Here’s what our MTD for VAT solution has being designed to feature:

The software will enable agents to submit their clients’ VAT returns direct to HMRC in the required MTD format.
It will enable agents to gather historic MTD VAT return data from HMRC and view it. This helps them to see what has been submitted historically, particularly if they have only recently started acting for the client.
It will provide a view of the progress of the current return before its submission.
The software will provide a window view of the client’s MTD VAT payments and refund history.
It will provide an online agent-client authorisation process with HMRC for MTD.
The software will integrate via APIs with Xero, Quickbooks, FreeAgent and Reckon One. We are currently working with those bookkeeping software providers to achieve this.
It will accept CSV imports from other bookkeeping packages and we are currently working with those providers to bring this about.

Our MTD for VAT software solution will be showcased at Accountex 2018 on 23 and 24 May this year (way before the Making Tax Digital VAT mandation in April 2019). We have a software development road-map in place to achieve this.

Find out ‘What is MTD VAT’ on the Gov.uk website

MTD for Business

MTD for Business has been the more controversial aspect of the Government’s Making Tax Digital plans. Petitions from across accounting, tax and business professional bodies and trade groups led to the Government delaying its introduction. See this article for more information.

Currently MTD for Business isn’t due to be mandatory until at least 2020. We remain to monitor its development, but it would appear to have been side-lined for now as MTD for VAT is brought about. The Government’s publication Next steps on the Finance Bill and Making Tax Digital is the latest update we have seen so far.

Making Tax Digital (MTD) – BTCSoftware’s view

We firmly believe that the current self-assessment form for certain people and businesses will be replaced with the Digital Tax Record (DTR). This is in essence what Making Tax Digital represents. At its heart is the ability to populate fields within the DTR by different feeds from third parties such as employers, Banks, Trading Bodies etc.

Whilst we do not agree with the way in which HMRC has gone about this, we also know they have committed a sizeable investment and infrastructure to the project. We had advised them of a far simpler way to achieve a DTR system – all they needed to do was digitise the current self assessment return forms and then allow those to be populated. This advice, however, sadly fell on deaf ears.

Saying that, the BTCSoftware team recognise that businesses will turn to accounting, tax and finance professionals to help them comply with whatever shape, form and requirements MTD for Business takes.

Keen to support and make those professionals’ lives easier, and their work more effective, we will continue to monitor HMRC’s development of Making Tax Digital. We will continue to work closely with their Digital Team to help them create and test their necessary technology.

Once HMRC have finalised their tests, we will integrate the resulting technology to work seamlessly in our software.

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