PAYE late filing penalties

There are late filing penalties in place for employers that don’t report payroll information on time. The size of the late filing penalties depends on the number of employees within the PAYE scheme.

Payments that are over 3 months late can be subject to an additional penalty of 5%.

HMRC has confirmed that having reviewed the effectiveness of the risk-based approach to late filing PAYE penalties, they have decided to continue with their same approach as for the 2019-20 tax year. This means that late filing penalties will continue to be reviewed on a risk-assessed basis, rather than being issued automatically. The first penalties for 2019-20 will be issued in September 2019.

This approach means, that penalties will not be charged automatically if Full Payment Submissions (FPSs) are filed late but within 3 days of the payment date and there is no pattern of persistent late-filing. This is not an extension to the statutory filing date, which remains unchanged, and HMRC has confirmed that employers who persistently file after the statutory filing date, but within three days thereof, will be monitored and may be charged a late filing penalty.

This move confirms that HMRC will continue to focus on penalising those who deliberately and persistently fail to meet statutory deadlines, rather than those who make occasional and genuine errors.