Service issues

Penalties for late filed return

The taxpayer had three part-time jobs in 2011-12 and received the personal allowance against each one. This led to an underpayment of tax. For unspecified reasons HMRC did not collect this by an adjustment in the taxpayer’s PAYE code but in June 2014 sent a self-assessment tax return to his last known address. The taxpayer submitted the return in March 2016 by which time late filing penalties had accrued. He appealed against these saying he had not received correspondence from HMRC and that he had made ‘countless phone calls’ to the department to try to rectify the situation.

The First-tier Tribunal noted that the taxpayer was a ‘first-time filer’ and his ‘awareness of what is entailed in filing a return was limited if not non-existent’. Further he had moved several times resulting in HMRC letters not reaching him....