{"id":134,"date":"2019-05-28T14:13:54","date_gmt":"2019-05-28T13:13:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/taxfix.com\/en-uk\/?p=134"},"modified":"2025-10-06T15:09:02","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T14:09:02","slug":"late-tax-return-penalties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/taxfix.com\/en-uk\/self-assessment-basics\/late-tax-return-penalties\/","title":{"rendered":"Late tax return penalties"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Every year almost 1 million people miss the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/taxfix.com\/en-uk\/uk-tax-year-dates-and-filing-deadlines\">tax filing deadline<\/a> and have to pay tax return penalties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are three different kinds of tax return penalties:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-filing-penalty\/\">A fine&nbsp;for <\/a><strong><a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-filing-penalty\/\">filing<\/a><\/strong><a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-filing-penalty\/\"> late<\/a><strong>:<\/strong>&nbsp;even if you owe no money in taxes<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>A separate <a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-payment-penalty\/\">fine&nbsp;for <\/a><strong><a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-payment-penalty\/\">paying<\/a><\/strong><a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/late-payment-penalty\/\"> your tax bill late<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Interest<\/strong>, also for paying your tax bill late<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Penalties for late filing<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Total fines for filing a year late start at <strong>\u00a31,600<\/strong> but can technically be unlimited &#8211; it all depends on how large your original tax bill was:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><thead><tr><th><strong>How late you are<\/strong><\/th><th><strong>Fine<\/strong>&nbsp;(each gets added to the others!)<\/th><\/tr><\/thead><tbody><tr><td>between 1 day and 3 months<\/td><td>\u00a3100 flat fine<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>between 3 months and 6 months<\/td><td>\u00a310 each day<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>between 6 months and 12 months<\/td><td>\u00a3300 flat or 5% of your tax bill (whichever is greater)<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>over 12 months<\/td><td>\u00a3300 flat or 5% of your tax bill (whichever is greater)<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Penalties for late payment<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>If you owe a tax bill and miss the payment deadline you will have to pay additional fines:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><thead><tr><th><strong>How late you are<\/strong><\/th><th><strong>Late payment penalty<\/strong><\/th><\/tr><\/thead><tbody><tr><td>between 1 day and 30 days<\/td><td>0<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>between 30 days and 6 months<\/td><td>5% of your tax bill<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>between 6 months and 12 months<\/td><td>another 5%<\/td><\/tr><tr><td>over 12 months<\/td><td>and another 5%<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Interest for paying late<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>This is calculated yearly, and it is (how else) added to your other penalties as well.<\/p>\n\n\n<\/div> <!-- .c-body -->\n\n<div class=\"b-highlight-mini m-neutral m-align-left\">\n    <div class=\"b-block-body\">\n        <p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As of <strong>May 7th 2025<\/strong>, the Bank of England\u2019s interest rate is \ud83d\udc49 <\/span><b>4.25%<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n\n    <\/div>\n<\/div> <!-- .b-highlight-mini -->\n\n<div class=\"c-body\">\n\n\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What you can do to reduce your tax return penalties<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>File it as quickly as possible\u00a0to stop the fines from adding up.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>If you have a <a href=\"\/en-uk\/glossary\/reasonable-excuse\/\">reasonable excuse<\/a> (a serious illness, etc.), then\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/taxfix.com\/en-uk\/self-assessment-basics\/appealing-an-hmrc-self-assessment-penalty\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">appeal the penalty &#8211; here&#8217;s how to do it<\/a>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>If you can&#8217;t afford to pay,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/difficulties-paying-hmrc\">file for an extension with HMRC<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every year almost 1 million people miss the&nbsp;tax filing deadline and have to pay tax return penalties. There are three different kinds of tax return penalties: Penalties for late filing Total fines for filing a year late start at \u00a31,600 but can technically be unlimited &#8211; it all depends on how large your original tax [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[436,435],"tags":[417,102],"class_list":["post-134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-deadlines-and-penalties","category-self-assessment-basics","tag-deadlines-penalties","tag-hmrc"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Late tax return penalties &#8211; Taxfix<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Every year almost 1 million people in the UK miss their tax filing deadline. 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