On the 17th of February 2015, an announcement on gov.uk said that HMRC would not start the RTI late filing penalty regime for the Full Payment Submission (FPS) if it was sent within 3 days of the payment date that is declared. So the FPS could be late filed but as long as it was filed within 3 days of the payment date then this was OK.
On the condition that the employer was not doing this deliberately or persistently.
This “easement” was supposed to end on the 5th of April 2019 meaning that the FPS had to be received on or before the payment date that was declared on the RTI submission.
On the 30th of July 2019, HMRC sent communication to members of the Employment and Payroll Group (EPG) as follows:
We wanted to alert you to the continuation of the risk-based approach to PAYE RTI penalties for the 2019-20 tax year. There are no changes to the approach and full details will be included in the forthcoming August edition of the Employer Bulletin which will be published week commencing Aug 12.
Global Payroll Association Comment
The gov.uk page has been updated with no end date to this 3 day concession. Despite us being well into the tax year 2019/20, it is good to know that this easement is continuing and we look forward to getting confirmation via the Employer Bulletin in August. Although, we would like to comment:
- It’s a shame that this was only circulated to some of the payroll profession via the EPG whilst the rest of us have to wait for the Employer Bulletin
- This is not a green light for employers to file their FPS returns late all of the time. Where late filing happens deliberately or persistently, HMRC will understandably consider them for a late filing penalty, plus
- The payday (the date employees are paid) and the payment date are different things. The payment date is the date the employee is normally or contractually entitled to be paid. The payment date is declared on the FPS but the payday is not and the two dates are not always the same, e.g. when someone is contractually entitled to be paid on the 25th but that date is bought forward because it falls on a non-banking day
On the 17th of February 2015, an announcement on gov.uk said that HMRC would not start the RTI late filing penalty regime for the Full Payment Submission (FPS) if it was sent within 3 days of the payment date that is declared. So the FPS could be late filed but as long as it was filed within 3 days of the payment date then this was OK.
On the condition that the employer was not doing this deliberately or persistently.
This “easement” was supposed to end on the 5th of April 2019 meaning that the FPS had to be received on or before the payment date that was declared on the RTI submission.
On the 30th of July 2019, HMRC sent communication to members of the Employment and Payroll Group (EPG) as follows:
We wanted to alert you to the continuation of the risk-based approach to PAYE RTI penalties for the 2019-20 tax year. There are no changes to the approach and full details will be included in the forthcoming August edition of the Employer Bulletin which will be published week commencing Aug 12.
Global Payroll Association Comment
The gov.uk page has been updated with no end date to this 3 day concession. Despite us being well into the tax year 2019/20, it is good to know that this easement is continuing and we look forward to getting confirmation via the Employer Bulletin in August. Although, we would like to comment:
- It’s a shame that this was only circulated to some of the payroll profession via the EPG whilst the rest of us have to wait for the Employer Bulletin
- This is not a green light for employers to file their FPS returns late all of the time. Where late filing happens deliberately or persistently, HMRC will understandably consider them for a late filing penalty, plus
- The payday (the date employees are paid) and the payment date are different things. The payment date is the date the employee is normally or contractually entitled to be paid. The payment date is declared on the FPS but the payday is not and the two dates are not always the same, e.g. when someone is contractually entitled to be paid on the 25th but that date is bought forward because it falls on a non-banking day