RTI

From April 2013 most small and medium sized business are required to send details of the amounts they pay their employees on or before the date the payments are made. This is a radical change in the way in which HMRC gathers information from employers as prior to April 2013 this sort of information was only required at the end of the tax year, when the P35 and associated returns were submitted. This is the first major change to the PAYE system since 1944.

HMRC call the process Real Time Information and employers will need to get their house in order as the information transfer has to be done online in the majority of cases. HMRC advise businesses to take action on the following three steps before April 2013:

Visit HMRC website for comprehensive information about RTI, including how to prepare, payroll software options and hints and tips to help avoid some common pitfalls.
Acquire new or updated payroll software – employers will need to talk to their payroll software provider or their payroll service-provider (if they have one) about this.
Start checking and updating employee information. It’s vital that the information employers have about their employees is accurate and up to date.

These generalised comments hide a multitude of tasks that must be completed before 6 April 2013.

From 6 April 2013 there are a number of payroll summaries you will need to submit every time you make a payment to employees, make adjustments to previous returns or adjust employees’ details. The returns required are:

Full Payment Submission (FPS) - sent each and every time you pay your employees.
Employer Payment Summary (EPS) - to report a reduction in the amount you pay to HMRC or if you haven't paid any employees in a pay period.
Employer Alignment Submission (EAS) - to align employee records with HMRC records before you submit other information. An EAS is only required for employers with a large PAYE scheme (over 250 employees) or with a payroll administered by two or more payroll systems.
Earlier Year Update (EYU) - to correct, after 19 April, any of the year to date totals submitted in your final FPS for the previous tax year.
National Insurance number Verification Request - to verify or obtain a National Insurance number for new employees

As you can see not only do you have to report payments when made but also periods when you have made no payments.

If you use our payroll services all of these changes will be handled for you:

our payroll software is compliant with RTI

If you still prepare your own payroll and need help with the transfer to RTI please call. You may also like to consider outsourcing your payroll processing from April 2013. Let us deal with the change and management of RTI for you?

And don’t forget the penalties... For the tax years 2012-13 and 2013-14 penalties will still be charged if the tax year data is not filed by 19 May following the end of each tax year. For 2013-14, there will be no penalties if in-year Full Payment Submissions (FPSs) are submitted late. From 2014-15 and onwards it is likely that penalties will be applied, for example if you are late sending in a monthly Full Payment Submission.

Forms You Will Need to Complete

New Starter Statement [pdf]

To be completed for each new employee and sent to Robins & Co with the ‘new employee form’
This form needs to be completed on screen and then printed and signed by the new employee.
If the form does not load, you will need to right-click on the link and select "save link as...", this will download the form to your computer.

New Employee Form [pdf]

To be completed for each new employee and sent to Robins & Co with the ‘new starter statement’.
This form needs to be printed, completed and signed by the employer.

Notification of a change in personal details [HMRC Link]

This needs to be completed if your employee changes their address, name and/or marital status.
To be completed on screen by the employee and submitted directly to HMRC.
Please also print this form Change in personal details [pdf] and ask them to complete, sign and return to Robins & Co.