Three-year delay

Late filing penalties

The taxpayer filed her 2011-12 tax return online in November 2013. HMRC issued penalties including daily penalties against which the taxpayer appealed on two grounds. First that HMRC had told her the filing date was deferred until 27 February because she was awaiting an activation code. Second she did not have access to her papers because she had moved home and had explained to HMRC why it was not possible to make estimates.

On 28 November 2013 HMRC wrote to the taxpayer refusing to cancel the initial and six-month penalties and telling her that because of the Donaldson case it could not yet finalise her appeal against daily penalties. This was settled by the Court of Appeal in July 2016 (CRC v Donaldson [2016] STC 2511 but she heard nothing more until 10 March 2017 when HMRC wrote rejecting her appeal.

The First-tier Tribunal agreed...