Pre-empting fine and avoiding next time

[langtonbrow]

Hello

Reposted from "income tax" as this appears to be a more appropriate forum. Several related questions.

My mother is incapacitated and cannot manage her own tax affairs. I do this now.
HMRC have "not received" paper Self Assessment tax return forms sent by post last July. I have belatedly discovered they haven't processed the document after telephoning to prompt them to send the bill. Hence I am liable for a penalty.

Q1 - Can I mitigate the penalty by paying x on account, where x will exceed the likely liability - which they will be able to calculate once they receive the form that I am about to send them (again).

Q2 - This is in part caused as my mother cannot get a government ID, by virtue of not having a passport or driving license. To them she is a non-person, which I find somewhat discriminatory. Hence her identity cannot be verified. Can I act as an agent on her behalf, obtaining an agent login to act for her? I am not professionally qualified but can usually manage a standard self assessment (apart from the postage part....).

All thoughts welcomed.

thank you.

[AGoodman]

Q1 - Yes, it is common to pay the tax at the same time as submitting the return (particularly people who file in January)
Q2 - No, there is a fair bit to becoming an agent (in HMRC parlance) and involves anti-money laundering regulation etc.

Is it possible to register her using her NI details? (I don't know, although i do know HMRC IT can be horribly user unfriendly for anything out of the ordinary so you have my sympathies).

[langtonbrow]

Thanks for the reply. I haven't bothered to calculate the tax as it involves partnership income as well, but I have bunged them more than they will likely need, in the hope that can we avoid a fine.
I don't hold out my hopes as the paper form has only now been re-sent and I expect they will lose it again. They are effectively scamming people through ineptitude.

Longer term registering as a "helper" may be possible assuming I can generate an ID for her. Later in the year this may be possible using credit records and SA return figures, which they now have.
Alternatively I may hand it over to a professional agent, based on my time taken to achieve very little.

Appreciate the thoughts.