Get Ready to Make Your Self Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) Claim
Contact from HMRC
HMRC began contacting taxpayers from 4 May 2020 who they believe may be eligible for the Coronavirus Self Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS).
Each taxpayer will receive one form of contact from HMRC either by: –
- E-mail – where HMRC hold an email address on file for the taxpayer or
- SMS – if HMRC have a mobile phone number on file but do not have an email address for the taxpayer or
- Letter- if HMRC do not have either an email address or mobile number for the taxpayer
Note that to guard against fraud the emails and SMS messages from HMRC will NOT include active links. If a taxpayer receives an email or SMS purporting to come HMRC which includes an active link, that email or SMS is a scam.
Can I make a claim?
HMRC will be contacting people who they believe are eligible taxpayers based on the information reported on their 2019, 2018 and 2017 Tax Returns.
Beware though as NOT all taxpayers that HMRC contact will in fact be eligible to claim SEISS. For example, taxpayers who ceased self-employment or incorporated their businesses during 2019/2020 or who are no longer trading in the current tax year 2020/2021. You must also have lost trading profits due to Coronavirus.
Preparing to make a claim – eligibility checker
To prepare for the claims service opening, HMRC is “inviting” taxpayers or their agents to check eligibility to make the claim online: –
https://www.tax.service.gov.uk/self-employment-support/enter-unique-taxpayer-reference
To do this you will need: –
- Your Unique Tax Payer Reference (UTR)
- Your National Insurance number
The checker will simply confirm whether HMRC believe that you are eligible to make a claim and when the portal will be open for you to make your claim. You will be asked to provide an email address for further correspondence.
Again please note that, even if your use the online checker correctly, you may get a false result advising you that you are eligible to make a claim if your status has changed (see above) since you lodged your 2019 Tax Return.
Please see our earlier blog which confirms who will be eligible for the scheme and how the taxable grant will be calculated: –
Where the eligibility checker gives a ‘not eligible’ result there is an option to ask HMRC to review the eligibility. This can be completed by either the taxpayer or their agent.
When will the claims portal open?
The portal will open on a staged basis between 13 – 18 May 2020 with the portal opening on different days for different taxpayers.
HMRC will email taxpayers who have provided an email address (when using the eligibility checker or to them previously) to confirm when the portal is open for them.
Taxpayers will then be required to log in to their government gateway account (or select the option to create a government gateway account) to complete the application process. If you do not already have a government gateway account, we would advise you to wait and set this up as the first step of the application process. This will ensure that the correct type of credentials are set up and will avoid the need to wait for an authorisation code in the post.
You will then be presented with a detailed calculation based on the information held on file by HMRC and will be asked to:
- read and accept the eligibility criteria and
- complete declarations, including to confirm that the business has been adversely affected by Coronavirus and
- supply the bank account details into which they would like the grant to be paid
The taxpayer does not need to provide any information about their income. The calculations are all prepared by HMRC based on the tax returns submitted. The process for disputing the amount of the grant offer has not yet been advised by HMRC.
How much can I claim?
Eligible taxpayers will be able to claim a taxable grant worth 80% of their average trading profits up to a maximum of £7,500 (equivalent to three months’ profits), paid in a single instalment.
The grant will be treated as part of your taxable income for 2019/2020.
HMRC expects to be given the power to enquire into claims, to require repayment of the grant and to charge penalties if they find that a false or inaccurate claim has been made.
When will the grant be paid?
HMRC will check the claim and expects to make payments from 25 May 2020 or within 6 working days of the application being submitted.
Our role as tax agents for clients
HMRC has “given serious consideration” to how it could allow agents to make claims on behalf of clients, “but it has not proved possible in the limited time available to develop the system and given the limited one off nature of the scheme.”
Unfortunately, we therefore cannot make the claims for clients, even if they give us their own Gateway ID credentials as HMRC will track the computer IP addresses being used. Agents using client credentials could therefore trigger HMRC fraud checks and this could delay payment of the grant to clients.
HMRC are actively encouraging taxpayers to contact their agents for advice. We are in the process of pulling together the figures required by our clients. Please see the section below – What we are doing to assist our clients
- We can use the eligibility checker for our clients and request a review for clients where the system gives the response that they are not eligible if we believe that they are.
- We can confirm if clients are definitely eligible to make a claim
- We can also confirm if the HMRC figures for the grant are correct
What if I am digitally excluded?
HMRC is developing an alternative telephone service for the digitally excluded but details of this are still awaited.
What we are doing to assist our clients
We are currently assessing the position for all our self-employed clients to establish if we believe that they may be eligible to make a claim. This will be based on the information on the 2019, 2018 and 2017 Tax Returns that we hold on our systems.
There is quite a bit of work involved in collating and checking the various figures and this is a priority for our tax team at the moment. We would ask for your patience whilst we undertake this exercise. We will then contact all relevant clients by 12 May 2020 to provide them with the figures that they will need to check the HMRC calculation.
In the meantime we would suggest that you: –
- Locate your Unique Tax Payer Reference (UTR) and your National Insurance number
You should be able to find these on the first page of your Tax Return
- Use the HMRC tracker to check that HMRC believe that you are eligible to make a claim: –
https://www.tax.service.gov.uk/self-employment-support/enter-unique-taxpayer-reference
This will also give you the chance to confirm your current email address to HMRC.
- If you already have a government gateway account set up, we suggest that you try logging into this in case you need to reset a lost password.
https://www.gov.uk/log-in-register-hmrc-online-services
If you do not already have a government gateway account, we would advise you to wait and set this up as the first step of the application process. This will ensure that the correct type of credentials are set up and will avoid the need to wait for an authorisation code in the post.
The information in this blog provides only an overview of HMRC guidance and legislation in force at the date of publication and no action should be taken without consulting the detailed HMRC guidance and legislation or seeking professional advice. Therefore no responsibility for loss occasioned by any person acting or refraining from action as a result of the material contained in this blog can be accepted by the firm.
Photo by Nelly Antoniadou on Unsplash
