The Tax Faculty has obtained clarification from HMRC on agent and business access to digital VAT services after a business has signed up to Making Tax Digital (MTD) for VAT. The availability of services that were previously available to businesses through their HMRC business tax account (BTA), and to agents through their HMRC online VAT agent portal has generated a number of queries from members.
The position can be summarised as follows:
|
Service |
Business Access |
Agent Access |
|
File a VAT 100 return |
Commercial software only |
Commercial software only |
|
View next payment due |
Commercial software and BTA |
Commercial software only |
|
View next return due |
Commercial software and BTA |
Commercial software only |
|
View payment history |
Commercial software and BTA |
Commercial software only |
|
View submitted returns |
Commercial software and BTA |
Commercial software only |
|
Change business name |
Agent services account (ASA) manage client details service |
|
|
Change of principal place of business |
||
|
Change VAT stagger group |
||
|
Change bank details for repayment |
Business Tax Account |
Service not available to agents |
|
Change email address |
Business Tax Account |
Service not available to agents |
|
Deregister for VAT (top 2 reasons) |
||
|
Set up or change a direct debit mandate |
Service not available to agents |
|
|
View VAT registration certificate |
Service in development |
Service in development |
HMRC will not be providing agents with online access to allow them to change a client’s email address or bank details for payment by direct debit or repayments. This decision has been taken on the advice of HMRC’s security team.
VAT registration certificates cannot currently be viewed online either by businesses or agents. HMRC is working to resolve this issue and the target date is August 2019. In the meantime it is recommended that a copy of the VAT registration certificate is printed before a business signs up to MTD for VAT. Copies of VAT registration certificates are available on request from the HMRC VAT helpline.
Agents have mentioned an issue with not being able to be logged in to both their agent portal and their agent services account at the same time. The suggested workaround is to use a different browser for each.
Please contact [email protected] if you have any feedback on MTD for VAT services.