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How to use your HMRC business tax account

Updated 22 March 2022

Your HMRC business tax account is an online account which brings together all your business taxes in one place.

From one sign in, you can view a summary of your business’s tax position for taxes that you have registered for. You can use your online tax services to complete tasks like making returns and payments.

If you already manage your business tax online, you can sign in to your business tax account.

Who can use a business tax account

Sole traders, partnerships and limited companies can use it to get details of their tax position for:

• Self Assessment
• PAYE
• VAT
• Corporation Tax
• over 40 other business taxes

Account administrators can give access to their team members to manage business taxes.

If you decide to use an agent to manage your tax affairs, you can still use the business tax account and add services to check what’s happening in your account.

Getting the most from your business tax account

To see all your taxes in your business tax account, you must only use one Government Gateway user ID. Do not create a new one. The one you use to sign into your business tax account must be the same one that you used to:

• register for your first tax
• register for any other business taxes (explained in sections ‘Adding or cancelling a business tax’ and ‘Further information’)

If you use more than one Government Gateway user ID you may be able to align your tax registrations and online services to one ID.

This guidance tells you how to add or cancel a business tax in your account in the section ‘Using your business tax account’.

How it works

Your business tax account has 2 separate areas:

• a top menu for managing your account, viewing secure messages and getting help
• a business tax summary (home page) to complete tasks relating to payments and returns

Your summary will give you access to online tax services linked with the ID you sign in with. It displays a tax card for each tax that you register for with that ID.

If your summary does not show all the taxes you have registered for, you may be using a different Government Gateway user ID, so you will need to:

• check the credentials that you use to sign in to your business taxes
• register for the taxes you want from your business tax account using these credentials

Setting up your HMRC business tax account

If you already manage your business tax online, you can sign in to your business tax account.

If you’re not set up yet, follow these steps to create a business tax account:

1. Register for a business tax — you may get a tax reference for your tax data.

2. Set up a Government Gateway user ID to get your organisation online — you should only use one.

3. Add the tax that you want to get access to using the Government Gateway user ID you got in step 2.

4. To start using the service you may need an Activation Code (also known as Activation PIN) and HMRC will post this to you (this can take up to 10 days).

Using your business tax account

Managing your account

In ‘manage account’ you can:

• add or remove a tax, duty or scheme
• give a team member access to a tax, duty or scheme
• add, view or change a tax agent and authorise them to act on your behalf
• view or change your account details (address, telephone, email, Government Gateway user ID and security preferences)
• sign up for paperless notifications

Adding or cancelling a business tax

You can add a tax to your business tax account either by choosing:

• ‘get online access to a tax, duty or scheme’ from the home page
• ‘add a tax, duty or scheme to your account’ from the top ‘manage account’ menu

To access the service you add, you may need an Activation Code (also known as Activation PIN). It can take up to 10 days to receive this in the post.

You can also remove a tax, duty or scheme. You can either:

• deregister — because you no longer need to make returns
• stop access — you will no longer see information about this tax in your business tax account

If you only stop access you’ll still need to make a return.

You will not lose your tax data. Your data will still be held in the relevant tax system even if you no longer have it in your business tax account.

Watch a video on how to add a tax to your business tax account in the ‘More information’ section.

Checking your tax position using your tax cards

Depending on the tax, your cards may show you:

• your tax reference number
• if you have a return to complete
• your balance (outstanding or overpaid tax)
• links to more detail such as payment and return information

Completing a return or payment related task

From a tax card you can get into your online service to:

• file a return
• make a payment

For most taxes you can also view:

• repayments HMRC owes you
• payments you have made
• interest on any late payments
• late payment or late filing penalties
• Direct Debit payment plans
• tax calculations for previous years

Adding a team member

Find out what steps to take to give a team member access to your business tax account.

More information

Watch a video about how to add a tax through your business tax account.