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HMRC pledge follows scheduled lack of service
Businesses that operate from Monday to Friday faced VAT difficulties last week, when HMRC’s online services were unavailable for three days.
The planned downtime from 4 April to 6 April meant numerous firms could not file their February 2013 returns on time for the 7 April deadline – although the taxman will not impose sanctions on submissions made early this week or expect reasonable excuse claims.
A message on the Revenue’s website had “strongly recommend[ed] that you submit the return before 4 April” – but a department spokesperson said, “No taxpayer will be penalised if a return or direct debit payment is a day or two late due to HMRC systems being unavailable during the period before the 7 April due date.
“We aim to make sure no surcharge notices are issued in such cases. So taxpayers will not need to write to or contact HMRC to claim reasonable excuse,” he added, and suggested that taxpayers who had tried unsuccessfully to file before 7 April retain records of error messages.
