11 Months to Digital Books Deadline Sole Traders & Landlords
Published / Last Updated on 01/05/2025
Time is now up for sole traders and landlords on Making Tax Digital (MTD) and Income Tax Self Assessment (ITSA). Having been postponed in 2023 and then 2025, the implementation schedule of MTD ITSA for sole traders and landlords is now fast approaching.
On 6th April 2026, all sole traders and landlords with turnover (not profit) of £50,000 pa or more will be required to use HMRC approved compatible software for bookkeeping and submitting quarterly summaries of their income and expenses to be submitted to HMRC, followed by an end-of-period statement to HMRC. This is what limited companies have been required to do for many years and finally, sole traders and landlords will fall under the same ‘umbrella’.
Timeline
- 6 April 2023 – MTD postponed.
- 6 April 2025 – MTD postponed.
- 6 April 2026 – All sole traders with turnover (not profit) of £50,000 start record keeping and HMRC quarterly filing under MTD. This will affect around 780,000 individuals.
- 6 April 2027 – All sole traders with turnover (not profit) of £30,000 start record keeping and HMRC quarterly filing under MTD. This will affect an additional 970,000 individuals.
- 6 April 2028 – All sole traders with turnover (not profit) of £20,000 start record keeping and HMRC quarterly filing under MTD. This will affect an additional 2-3 million individuals.
See: Autumn Budget 2024 Budget 24 MTD & Tax Returns for All and Spring Statement 2025 Spring Statement 25
11 months will ‘fly by’ when you are busy running your business or property portfolio, so you need to act now.
Start investigating compatible software now. Start usual their trials now.
For a list of HMRC approved compatible software see:
- https://www.gov.uk/guidance/find-software-thats-compatible-with-making-tax-digital-for-income-tax#software-available-now
- There are currently 21 live, compatible software packages and 13 still in development.
- There are some free options.
- There are paid for options that do much more than just basic quarterly and annual returns such as quotes, invoicing, bank record imports, payroll and more.
