Agent site tax account not reflecting HMRC system

Tax account difference between agent system and HMRC system

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I looked at a self-assessment client's record on the agent system yesterday, and was surprised to see a £1,200 balance payable - the client usually pays what I recommend. I emailed the client, who said he had paid by debit card on 31 January and sent me a copy of the payment receipt overnight. I expected to see an error in the payment reference but no, the reference was correct.

I called the agent dedicated line this morning. The officer told me that the payment showed on their system as received on 2 February, and the account was clear. I asked them to send out a statement, and to pass a message up the line to find out what had happened and fix it.

We are used to there being a delay in the agent system being updated from the live system, but this is the first concrete example I have seen of a non-timing difference between the agent system and the main HMRC system [in SA or CT (edited)].  I just wanted to ask whether other people have seen similar things.

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By Maslins
31st May 2017 11:42

In PAYE, yes. On multiple occasions HMRC PAYE call centre staff have told us words to the effect of "Oh you can't trust the numbers in the portal, they're often wrong". Helpful.

Don't think we've seen it for other taxes though.

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Replying to Maslins:
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By stuart carpenter
31st May 2017 11:59

Yes, I should have been more specific - we know that the PAYE interface is a work in progress, to be polite. I have generally trusted the agent version of SA and CT records at least to reflect HMRC's own system, albeit with delays, allowing us to see and sort out errors. I will be rather worried if this is widespread.

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blue sheep
By NH
31st May 2017 11:55

we have only seen this on PAYE which is not worth even bothering with, I have clients still showing credits on the PAYE account from 2 years ago that I know have been used against CT as it shows on the CT record!

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By GW
31st May 2017 12:08

We've seen problems with PAYE and VAT, not SA
Typical example - current issue, PAYE where HMRC have "misplaced" CIS suffered. Debt Management produce a split of the balance they think is due, this is made up of the most recent months. Online gives a different total even allowing for delays in posting entries, this shows a mixture of debit and credit balances going back several years. We just received a letter from the CIS section and are in the process of agreeing it to our records, so far it appears to agree with what we expected but the RTI side of it differs from both the debt management and the online versions, so ignoring the CIS amounts HMRC have three versions of the RTI figures.
In addition the online PAYE figures tell me that for 2017/18 £5,900 is due for Month 1 while the total for the year (which so far is only month 1) is £6,600.
For another client we have a similar problem with the VAT account where the figures the client accessed online differ from the figures from debt management, neither of which agree with our calculations based on returns filed and payments made.

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