HMRC tax enquiries jumped by over 20 per cent final 12 months within the house of simply two years with 2999,000 enquiries final 12 months

The UK’s 4.3m self-employed employees have been suggested to prioritise their tax compliance after official HMRC knowledge exhibits that the tax authority opened 299,000 tax enquiries final 12 months – a 52,000 bounce equal to 21% in comparison with two years earlier than.

The statistics, gathered from HMRC’s quarterly efficiency updates, present that the variety of tax enquiries (known as ‘civil compliance checks’) opened by HMRC rose from 247,000 within the 2020/21 monetary 12 months, to 265,000 in 2021/22 and 299,000 in 2022/23. In complete, this marks a 21.05% improve throughout these years.

The numerous improve in compliance exercise noticed the tax workplace internet £814bn in tax income in 2022/23 – an 11.3% bounce in comparison with the earlier 12 months.

Within the first quarter of the 2023/24 monetary 12 months (April to June 2023), the tax workplace has already opened 77,000 enquiries, which means HMRC is on track to extend this for the third 12 months working (308,000).

Consequently, tax insurance coverage supplier, Qdos, has urged tens of millions of self-employed employees and the rising variety of folks with facet hustles to be aware of HMRC ramping up its compliance exercise.

Qdos CEO, Seb Maley, commented: “HMRC is clearly on a mission to extend tax receipts and we’re seeing first-hand expertise of this. The variety of self-employed employees being investigated by the tax workplace is noticeably on the rise.

“A much more lively HMRC signifies that anybody working for themselves – whether or not a full-time freelancer or somebody with a facet hustle – ought to make sure that they file their tax returns and pay their payments on time, because the naked minimal.

“However that is simply a place to begin. What’s typically missed is that HMRC can examine anybody at any time. You possibly can by no means rule out a tax enquiry and all too typically, individuals who have performed nothing mistaken are investigated. With out illustration and safety, this could be a actually aggravating and costly course of.”