Small company accounts

Be gentle with me, as I am in a purely audit environment with 1 active private client.

This client formed a limited company on 11 February 2010. I changed the accounting reference date to 31 03.

The client has had no income to date, but has been incurring a lot of expenses as he searches for the right location to take up a franchise. The company is VAT registered.

I can prepare company accounts for him to 31 03 11. (These are due by 11 November 2011.)

My question is, what do I need to invest in?

VT Software will produce iXBRL accounts, and also the disclosures should be ok, but what about HMRC? Taxcalc is very expensive, considering I only have one client, and do not have the inclination at present to get more clients. Can I use the HMRC software, or do I just ask them to accept a nil return for the 13.5 months period to 31 03 11? If they accept a nil return, can this be manual?

Thanks in anticipation

SA