Making Tax Digital

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By Tornado
22nd Jul 2025 12:59
In a nutshell then -

Nobody believes HMRC

That is how bad the situation really is.


Replying to Tornado:
By Jo Nokes
22nd Jul 2025 14:18
Just who in the HMRC hierarchy is composing these statements that seem to defy any logic. Why do we never see any attempt to refute the criticisms that appear here.

[Lambs]

Oh, if only you knew...

x

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I'll help out with this warning from FactChecker...he rates J-P more highly than me because I have him at -100:

By FactChecker
22nd Jul 2025 21:51
J-P 'no' Marks: “HMRC will look very different by 2030; almost all our straightforward customer queries will be handled digitally or automatically, with at least 90% of customer interactions being digital.”

OK ... so that deals with some of the most 'straightforward' queries p.a. - but what about all the other tens of thousands (possibly millions) of queries that are a tad more complex and directly impact on the accuracy (or otherwise) of tax paid?

The only two things that can be guaranteed from this stance:
1. Taxpayers (increasingly driven towards being unrepresented) will give up on any attempt at doing things 'right' - instead focussing purely on what reduces their tax-bill;
2. HMRC staff will know even less about every aspect of tax that isn't written down for them on a 'cheat sheet' - and will have absolutely no incentive to learn more.

This is no longer a hybrid of Gadarene swine and a passing herd of lemmings ... it is teetering towards Dr Strangelove territory, with J-P's finger hovering above the button of destruction (as he helps build the cliff from which they will be encouraged to launch themselves into the never-never).

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And there is more:

By Jimess
23rd Jul 2025 10:29
Being part way through reading "The Post Office Scandal" for the second time, I can envisage all sorts of problems with MTD and digital taxation systems. The blind faith and ideology that "the computer is always right" even supported by the courts in the early days of the Horizon debacle was astounding. The inability for the sub postmasters to see detailed data meant that they were working blind much of the time. This is my worry with MTD and HMRC preparing the tax computations from MTD data - is this going to be yet another tax calculation that only looks at the data submitted under MTD as they do with the P800's using information from P60's, coding notices and state pension and benefits information? If so it will be almost back to the old days of different tax assessments for the different schedules (types) of tax except in the case of MTD they have just singled out two income streams - sole traders and landlords. What goes around comes around... At least when SA came in we could see the need for integration into one tax return and could see the positive benefits of it, but MTD seems to be breaking that integration apart for no good reason that I can see.

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Some great posts :

By RICHARDBIBBY
23rd Jul 2025 19:33
More claptrap from HMRC.
Which professional bodies have given a caution welcome to this? Presumably the same one's who thought MTD was a great idea.

It's time the professional bodies stood up for their Members and challenged HMRC on these vague proposals. They are not doing their job.

Whenever digitisation by is mentioned by HMRC, and now AI you just know it will be a disaster.

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By Tornado
24th Jul 2025 13:55
Speaking to a number of people over the last few days, not just clients, I get a real feeling that many people are approaching the end of their tether. This is not just taxation, but all of the usual problems like illegal immigration, local Councils, business rates, council tax, etc.

I feel that we have all been pushed to the brink and soon we will be seeing a tangible backlash against Government Policies such as Digital First where all of our daily lives will be controlled by logical, ruthless computers without any regard for human beings.

This may sound a bit over the top but is not Digital First a tangible example of this?

Fortunately, I also feel that this will not happen as we will not allow it, so that dreary, grey world devoid of compassion and reason will never materialise but hopefully just stay locked away in the minds of the dictatorial architects of these fantasies.

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By monkeypuzzle
25th Jul 2025 19:32
Now scrap this MTD ITSA fiasco!


By AJACK
26th Jul 2025 11:37
MTD is the worst idea i have ever heard. It does not decrease the tax gap, it just adds a compliance burden to small sole traders

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By FactChecker
29th Jul 2025 15:19
"Communication is the key to MTD progress":
There's a problem both with that title and with nearly everything that follows it in the quotes within the article ... any relevant and effective variety of 'Communication' is a 2-way process.

Whereas the actions described all seem to be the 1-way variant ('keep clients informed', 'create that awareness', 'we talk to them', 'explaining to the client', 'communicating it to them', 'telling them', etc).
All good and necessary stuff (which I'd have hoped would be part of their day-to-day operations and not just something pulled out of the bag because of MTD) ... but where's the engagement? The sense of working together (rather than treating clients like junior school pupils needing to be controlled)?

The most telling quote is: “They’re not remotely interested. A lot of our clients are saying they don’t even know what MTD is, let alone trying to convince them to do something before they have to.”
And who can blame those clients?

It's not as though any aspect of MTD ITSA is even nailed down (from the brand new draft replacement Regulations, to the gaps in the technical/developer specifications and unsurprising holes in the early guidance).
If you search just the last month's contributions on Aweb from those who are expert in their fields and have no vested interest in the success or failure of the current project ... you will quickly observe that these uncertainties & omissions are not just the ravings of the disaffected, but actual evidence that the project is not ready to go live - and should not be allowed to do so.

Whether the launch is cancelled at the last moment OR is merely watered-down to what would be tantamount to a voluntary option OR is glibly launched into a rapid oblivion ... why would anyone volunteer to be a passenger a day earlier than required?

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By kevinringer
30th Jul 2025 09:56
"Communication is the key to MTD progress"

I agree, it's about time HMRC started communicating, instead of repeating the same "get ready" that they have been bleating for the last 10 years. For a start, HMRC can publish the exemption criteria and allow us to start applying for exemption. HMRC have had 10 years to do this, and because MTD was supposed to start in 2017, the exemption criteria should have been published by 2016.

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By Tornado
01st Aug 2025 17:14
I am still struggling to work out why this complex system has been created?

It is far more complex (and thus prone to errors) than the well tried and tested Self Assessment system and I am looking at the vast amount of work involved in adjusting the cash based quarterly reporting to a set of Accounts in accordance with Accounting Standards based on Accruals, Creditors, Prepayments and Debtors.

HMRC are simply trashing and stomping all over the methods of calculating profits that have been in use since ancient times, and have endured because those are the best ways to compare and calculate profits & losses. Standards are the obvious way to understand financial information.

I still do not buy it and HMRC are clearly still struggling themselves with this and are now calling the final submission a Tax Return after all this time. As Emma says, at least MTD Tax Return is a better description (which they stupidly cannot see for themselves)

The whole project should be scrapped, it clearly has no chance of working based on the hundreds of anomalies that are still to fix or have not even been considered yet.

Thank you for the Article Emma.