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Where Taxpayers and Advisers Meet

Losses to carry forward

someone
Posts:692
Joined:Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:09 am
Losses to carry forward

Postby someone » Wed May 08, 2019 6:18 pm

I'm doing my tax return online (2018-19 tax year)

Property income:

Box 43 - losses to carry forwards is zero. But I have losses to carry forwards from last year.

I cannot see how to make this box have the correct value. The value is uneditabe online.

I cannot put the full loss from my 2017/18 tax return into box 39 as it clamps this at the profit for this year. (which makes sense)

So how do I get the loss carried forwards into box 43?

The restricted finance interest part has a separate box for this year and last years carried forward value so that is easy.

(It would be easy if I was filling in the paper tax return - perhaps that's the answer :-( )

robbob
Posts:3228
Joined:Wed Aug 06, 2008 4:01 pm

Re: Losses to carry forward

Postby robbob » Thu May 09, 2019 10:07 am

(It would be easy if I was filling in the paper tax return - perhaps that's the answer :-( )
To be fair the days of paper returns were a complete nightmare - one wrong or missed box and then hmrc would amend 19 correct boxes later on rather than just realise that there was an error in that earlier box - i guess we should never blame hmrc if the wrong box is completed. In some respects the apparent anomaly if probably/possibly (later comment on no it isnt !) designed to stop you making just such an error.

Anyway back on point.

It looks like this is a known "glitch" that hmrc are too lazy/dont have resources/any other non reasonable excuse - to fix - that's based on the lovely sounding Banzais quote from a random web article - i wouldn't normally rely or random unknown web comments being more reliable than hmrc but looks like this is probably the case here - probably worth checking with hmrc that it is their incompetence if they have had a whole year to fix it and cant be bothered - its not exactly a complicated set of boxes to get right.

Anyway thanks to Banzai (and other contributors on the linked thread) for putting hmrc to rights - note for clarity this was a 2018 return glitch so the answer for 2019 may be different !!! but probably isnt

https://forums.landlordzone.co.uk/forum/tax-questions/1032089-carrying-forward-losses-over-multiple-years-a-bug-in-the-self-assessment-form
I have just spoken to HMRC on the phone.
There is a system issue if you try to carry forwards a previous loss when you are also declaring a loss for the current year's return.
The HMRC operator consulted a technician colleague and the following is the solution offered:
1) Leave the box "Loss brought forward used against this year's profits" blank.
2) Click "Save and Continue"
3) Add comments in the box to explain the previous loss, the current loss and the total loss to be carried over to 2018/19.
I also made mention that the additional text was agreed during a phone call to HMRC and added today's date.
I hope this helps.
Banzai

someone
Posts:692
Joined:Mon Feb 13, 2017 10:09 am

Re: Losses to carry forward

Postby someone » Thu May 09, 2019 10:40 am


It looks like this is a known "glitch" that hmrc are too lazy/dont have resources/any other non reasonable excuse - to fix - that's based on the lovely sounding Banzais quote from a random web article - i wouldn't normally rely or random unknown web comments being more reliable than hmrc but looks like this is probably the case here - probably worth checking with hmrc that it is their incompetence if they have had a whole year to fix it and cant be bothered - its not exactly a complicated set of boxes to get right.

Anyway thanks to Banzai (and other contributors on the linked thread) for putting hmrc to rights - note for clarity this was a 2018 return glitch so the answer for 2019 may be different !!! but probably isnt

https://forums.landlordzone.co.uk/forum/tax-questions/1032089-carrying-forward-losses-over-multiple-years-a-bug-in-the-self-assessment-form
That is great! Thank you!

I'm not in quite the same position in that I did make a profit this year but it's not enough to completely use up my losses from last year so I have some to carry forward to next year.

Shame that the helpline couldn't have told me it was a known problem rather than pass me from one helpline to another (with the final result being I needed to call the number I had dialed!)


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