Did I something wrong?

[tescojim]

Hi everyone

Firstly my language is not native English so sorry if I do a mistake.
I live in the UK since 2009 and I have taken over a cleaning business (partnership) from someone from April 2010. Im not familiar with English law and VAT -TAX at all but now I`ve arrived to that point when I have to make this clear.
When we took over this cleaning business the previous owner sort of "taught" us how to fill in the VAT boxes on HM Revenue`s website. Ha said (now I think wrongly) we should type in each field "0". Few days ago we reveived a letter from HM Revenue about cancelling our VAT registration as "we have not made any recent taxable supplies". Well, this letter a bit scared me out and I started to look after things. (Might be to late) The previous owner said as we are under VAT threshold we have to type always zero in each field. He also said we do not have to pay the VAT for HM Revenue we can keep it. What to do now? I would really appreciate ANY advice! We`ve been giving our invoices with 20% since April 2010. Now we have to pay that 20% VAT for HM Revenue from April 2010 till now? Everything?

Thanks

[Generix]

If you were VAT registered then the threshold doesn't apply, as you are already registered, and any taxable supplies you make need to be accounted for.

So yes, you need to pay all of the VAT to HMRC on your sales (less any VAT paid on your costs).

[tescojim]

Thanks for your answer. This is how I assumed. I will start to sort this out ASAP.