COVID-19: VAT deferral payment scheme open for registrations

HMRC’s VAT deferral payment scheme registration portal launched on Tuesday 23 February, other than for those on the annual accounting or payments on account schemes who will be able to join later in March.

A taxpayer who deferred VAT payments relating to VAT returns due during the period from 20 March to 30 June 2020, must either repay the outstanding VAT in full by 31 March 2021, or sign up for the deferral payment scheme by 21 June 2021. Note that the payment scheme requires taxpayers to proactively register; it is not automatically applied and an agent is not able to complete this registration on behalf of clients. If taxpayers register for the scheme, the deferred VAT repayments can be spread over up to 11 monthly smaller payments from March. Please note that HMRC will request the initial instalment when signing up for the scheme.

See gov.uk which contains the link to apply and HMRC’s press release for fuller details.