Company accounts and tax returns now go through software

What changed, and when

Who it affects

The accounts change reaches every company on the register, whether it files its own accounts or pays someone to do it. Companies House puts it this way: As announced earlier this year, from April 2028, we will require all UK registered companies to file their accounts in Inline eXtensible Business Reporting Language (iXBRL) format using commercial software. Property companies are included, which matters because a company that lets property sits outside Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, so these are the filing rules that apply to it instead. The guide for limited-company landlords explains how the two fit together.

Sole traders and ordinary partnerships do not file a Company Tax Return. GOV.UK says that you do not send a Company Tax Return if you’re self-employed as a sole trader or in a partnership - but you must send a Self Assessment return.

The duty to file accounts does not depend on whether the company is busy. Companies House’s guidance, filing your Companies House accounts, says that all companies must file annual accounts with Companies House - even if you’re dormant or not trading.

The deadlines a company works to

A company has two bodies to file with, and each works to its own clock. The tax deadlines run from the accounting period, which GOV.UK explains like this: Your accounting period for Corporation Tax is the time covered by your Company Tax Return. It’s normally the same 12 months as the company financial year covered by your annual accounts.

The tax falls due before the return does: 9 months and 1 day after the accounting period ends for the payment, against 12 months for the return.

GOV.UK’s lists of software

HMRC and Companies House each publish their own list of software that can file with them. Neither list shows prices or ranks the products. We have read the prices of the products that appear on both lists, and of some that appear on HMRC’s list alone, and set them out alphabetically with the date of each check in company filing software and what it costs. Each product also has a page of its own, for example Ayiza, Easy Digital Filing and gbooks. If the price is what you would like to compare first, the same products in order of price sorts them by what a year of filing costs one company. To see how companies file their accounts today, our monthly counts of the software used to file company accounts show the share that comes through Companies House’s own service.

A product on HMRC’s list may handle only part of the return, so check what it files before you choose. These commercial software suppliers can produce one or more elements of a Company Tax Return with HMRC. You should consider which elements you need and make sure the software you choose allows you to file:

• a CT600
• a Corporation Tax computation
• your company accounts

The computation is the part where HMRC’s rules are still being worked out. HMRC is developing a standardised format for the computation. It has published the first specifications, but it is not asking for the new format yet. In HMRC’s words: We will not require computations to be submitted in this format until phase 2 of the work to develop the requirements has been completed, and a timetable for the changes has been confirmed. No timetable has been published, so for now there is no date to plan around.

Guides in this section

These guides are for directors of limited companies, property companies included, who file accounts with Companies House and a Company Tax Return with HMRC.