Making Tax Digital

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Ed Balls/Susanna Reid-can you please get MP Murray on your show and quiz him on the delays below and ask him why he thinks it is a good idea to introduce MTD4IT which presumably will soak up even more HMRC resources when they are clearly already at the point of drowning.


By kevinringer
30th Sep 2025 14:34
When HMRC opened the exemption application process for MTD VAT, HMRC responded to my applications within 1 month. That was the pre-Covid HMRC. Yesterday I progress chased a Form 17 that had been submitted to HMRC in June 2025. Where's my reply said HMRC were processing 5 March 2025 for many SA paper post items = 208 days' backlog. I phoned the ADL who confirmed they'd received the Form 17 on 25 June 2025 and don't expect to process it until 5 May 2026 = 314 days' backlog. That means for post received between 5 March 2025 and 25 June 2025 (112 days), the backlog is going to increase from 208 days to 314 days. This is an increase of 106 days over a period of 112 days. In other words, HMRC anticipates it will take almost 2 days to deal with each 1 day's post. There are even larger backlogs outside of SA eg Marriage Allowance by post is currently processing 2 January 2025. Given these unacceptable delays, just how will HMRC turn around MTD ITSA exemptions in 28 days because HMRC can't divert resources from other processes without increasing backlogs elsewhere? Could it be that under pressure to process applications, HMRC staff will end up either accepting or rejecting en masse without proper consideration?

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How long would Tesco remain in business if:

- your internet shop took 314 days to arrive?

- they overspent on projects at this level?

Last Updated: 09 August 2023
HMRC's Making Tax Digital (MTD) project has overrun in costs by over £1 billion, and its still only half-baked.The National Audit Office (NAO) has issued a report, ‘Value for Money - Progress with Making Tax Digital’ which confirms that its not value for money. The taxpayer will conclude that the project has been poorly designed and mismanaged.

None of this comes as any surprise to anyone following the progress of the digital by default project. HMRC's then Tax Assurance Commissioner Jim Harra (who is now its Chief Executive), had readily admitted on BBC Radio 4 Moneybox in 2017 that the MTD program brings no cost savings to HMRC.

HMRC’s initial estimate in 2016 of the cost of introducing MTD for VAT, Income Tax and Corporation Tax was £226 million.

The total forecasted cost for MTD for Income Tax alone is now £1.3 billion, a 400% increase in real terms.

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When Ofwat was abolished did all of their staff move sideways to regulate HMRC?

How can you get to a point where an organisation is letting people wait 314 days for a reply?

We read review after review where the conclusion is HMRC is providing a shit service and then those regulating HMRC allow them to get even worse.

To allow a timebomb like MTD4IT to explode on what must be an already frazzled workforce is mind-blowingly stupid...totally reckless...and yet we keep hearing it is going to go ahead.

Is my reasoning flawed?

Note to self...mention Ed Balls in a thread and the readership explodes.

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Seen at the start of the Cardiff half marathon this morning was a placard which said 'You're running better than the Government'.

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https://www.accountancydaily.co/scrap-mtd-petition

15051 signatures


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Waiting for 6 days for a government response (another 308 days to wait?)

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, https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/729235

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Waiting for 7 days for a government response

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90 per cent of TrustPilot responses rank HMRC at 1 star (lowest ranking possible)...example below:

Obscene waiting times and delays for nothing
Near impossible to get through and then impossible to get any meaningful information from the remarkably ignorant agents. How about "getting our fingers out" rather than "making tax digital".
Shame there isn't a special ZERO star category

We have regulator review after regulator review that suggests the TrustPilot feedback is correct, but are there ever any follow-up action points e.g. JP -100,000 Marks, when and how are you going to improve HMRC telephone services?....and then further follow-up to check that the action plan is working.

All regulation of HMRC appears half baked....has anyone asked JP to explain 314 day post wait times yet?....seemingly just a gravy train for the regulators to eat prawn sandwiches at taxpayer expense achieving very little.

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Waiting for 9 days for a government response

Still also waiting for someone to ask JP/MP M about 314 day post waiting times.Are Labour even aware this is reality?

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Over 1,000 new signatures in a few days:

Stop HMRC implementing making tax digital and enforcing quarterly submissions
HMRC is pushing ahead with Making Tax Digital: a scheme that requires all business to maintain digital accounts. Currently many small businesses use paper accounting records or spreadsheets. Small businesses may lack the skills, time and funding to maintain digital accounts.


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Waiting for 10 days for a government response