UK specific: MTD - Making Tax Digital

[Maf. King]

On Monday, 17 April 2017 20:06:15 BST Mike Evans wrote:
> On Mon, 17 Apr 2017 19:34:36 +0100
> 
> "Maf. King" <maf at chilwell.net> wrote:
> > On Monday, 17 April 2017 16:39:02 BST Alain Williams wrote:
> > > On Mon, Apr 17, 2017 at 04:00:20PM +0100, David Goodenough wrote:
> > > > Apparently they have effectively locked out open source software as
> > > > there
> > > > is a per application (i.e. there would be one just for GnuCash)
> > > > "secret"
> > > > that is used during the OAuth2 login.  Keeping that value secret is
> > > > not
> > > > possible in open source (closed source just hard code it into their
> > > > code)
> > > > so effectively open source can not be used.
> > > 
> > > Do you have a reference for that ?
> > > 
> > > With all of the fuss that the UK gov't is making about open source it
> > > would
> > > be interesting to see them justify that.
> > > 
> > > How long before someone extracts/dumps-to-the-web the secret for a few
> > > popular applications like Sage ? Mind you: sage would love it - once the
> > > secret is invalidated they get to charge everyone who has bought a copy
> > > for
> > > the new version.
> > > 
> > > How about a shim for a small binary executable - does its bit and gets
> > > out
> > > of the way ? I know that it is not ideal, but might be a pragmatic
> > > solution.
> > 
> > Hi Alain,
> > 
> > Not wishing to jump the gun or presume _anything_ about the workings of
> > HMRC, but...
> > 
> > A few years ago, they made all employers report the details of each wage
> > packet in the few days prior to payment being made (to old way was
> > basically down to the employer to do the "right thing" each payday, and
> > keep track and finally report at the end of the tax year. It was
> > relatively complex to deal with manually, but not overly so for a small
> > business with only a handful of employees)
> > 
> > I believe Sage & QB et al can do all this and submit the relevant monthly
> > figures.  However, GC can't.  But HMRC have released a package called
> > Basic
> > PAYE Tools (or something like that) which does the calcs for you, and
> > submits the data to HMRC in what appears to be simple XML (encrypted for
> > TX, but I don't know how well encrypted).  And it does the year-end
> > paperwork (P60) too....
> > 
> > The good news is that 1. PAYE Tools is free (beer, not open source) and 2.
> > Available or Mac, Win & Linux (notionally Ubuntu IIRC, but quite happy on
> > OpenSuSE in my experience over the last 5 or so years)
> > 
> > I'm not going to assume that Digital Tax will be dealt with in a similar
> > fashion - but the precedent exists, at least, which might be some small
> > comfort  If employers running only Linux systems are sufficient in number
> > to be looked after, I have to hope that the number of individuals who
> > will be required to report quarterly must be a greater number...
> > 
> > Or I figure that even worst case, they'll have a web-form that one can
> > submit data with.
> > 
> > 0.02 - no inside knowledge!
> > Maf.
> 
> As a self employed UK person I have tried, casually so far, to to find any
> data, APIs, whatever relating to HMRC MTD and have been unable to find much
> at all that is useful to me,  The thought of having to install some HMRC
> 'approved' software is abhorrent to me. I am, as far s I can ascertain, of
> the impression that the data format is XML but clearly an API key and auth
> is required but I've not been able to able to find out anything more.
> Although with limited time/resources this doesn't mean much.
> 
> It's clear though that in the UK we will be forced to use 'MMRC approved'
> software in the future to file our tax returns.  How to become 'MMRC
> approved' and what the exact protocol is are elusive to me, so far.
> 


Hi Mike,

I meant to say in my previous, slightly rambling post that the HMRC BPT 
submits the data using a Government Gateway login - which you probably already 
have to view your Personal Tax Account  & file your personal tax return.  

Quite how BPT auths and what it uses as the backend is beyond my ken.  TBH, I 
was grateful that HMRC provided their own program so I didn't have to buy a 
Win Box & "approved" software -  you know the usual suspects - just to pay 
them tax...

Maf.