Eight-year late appeal application refused

The taxpayer completed the 2012-13 self assessment tax returns for his wife and for himself on the evening of 31 January 2014. HMRC had sent notices to file the returns on 6 April 2013. However although he believed the returns had been submitted they had not. As a result HMRC issued late filing penalties. It later cancelled the penalties for the wife’s return because there was no tax liability.

The taxpayer said he only became aware that his return had not been filed on time in 2022 when he reviewing his finances with his adviser. He then made a late appeal against the penalties.

The taxpayer said he had reasonable excuse for the submission failure. He said there ‘multiple crashes of HMRC’s website’. He asserted that he had filed his return on time but that HMRC’s systems had lost it. However he received no online...