Correspondence

Edition 4: Ready, Steady, File!

Published 9 April 2026

Welcome to the final edition of Ready, Steady, File!  We are delighted to confirm that Making Tax Digital (MTD) for Income Tax moves into live service from 6 April 2026. 

We’d like to extend our sincere thanks to all the businesses, agents and software partners who have taken part in the MTD beta. Your engagement, insights and constructive feedback have been invaluable in helping us shape and strengthen the service. 

Thanks to your contributions, we are in the strongest possible position for a smooth rollout and a successful go live.

Software partners preparing for mandation  

Our software partners have been working closely with us to ensure their products are fully ready for rollout and go live.   

Throughout the testing phase, they’ve played a key role in testing integrations, improving user journeys and working with us to identify where guidance or technical support could make the biggest difference.  

Many providers have now completed in-year compatibility checks, refined error messaging and made usability enhancements based on real user feedback gathered during the testing phase. This collaboration has helped strengthen the overall service and gives businesses and agents confidence that MTD compatible software will be ready when they need it.  

We’d like to thank all our software partners for their continued engagement and for the time they’ve invested in assisting HMRC, preparing their products and customer bases for mandation.   

Their commitment has been essential in helping us deliver a smooth and reliable experience for users as we move into go live.

Testing highlights

Customer participation  

As of the end of March 2026, around 9,500 customers had opted into the public beta. Of these, approximately 4,500 were classified as active participants. Around half of all sign-ups were driven by agents (approximately 48%), with 52% coming directly from individuals.  

Across the 2025 to 2026 tax year, so far, the service has received around 3,500 successful submissions in quarter 1, 5,000 in quarter 2, 6,000 in quarter 3 and around 1,000 at the opening of the quarter 4 submission period. A customer may need to submit more than one submission for different income types.   

Customer profiles within the beta show a diverse range of business and property types. Approximately 6,200 participants reported single self-employment, 300 reported multiple self-employments, and around 1,600 customers reported single UK property income. A smaller number reported single foreign property (around 6 customers), while a further 175 had mixed property types. Around 1,250 participants had combined property and employment income profiles.  

Performance and volume testing  

Performance and volume testing highlights include:  

• customers successfully adding an additional income source or cease a previous income source    

• high income child benefit charge, marriage allowance and student loans now included in end of year calculations  

• taxpayers being able to view their obligations, calculation and business income sources in their view and change services  

• beginning to test the capability of late payment penalties and penalty points 

• continuing to test the control gateway to ensure it can handle an increased volume of sign-ups

What we still need from you

As we move into the next phase, it’s important that we gather complete and accurate insight into the end of year process for the 2025 to 2026 tax year. To do that, we need your continued support in completing the key steps in the journey.  

To help us ensure the service is ready for wider rollout, please:  

1. submit your fourth quarterly update by 7 May 2026 — this is the most important update in the cycle and completing it on time helps us fully understand and test the user journey
2. submit your end of year tax return through your MTD compatible software — where your software allows, complete and send your return directly through your MTD software before 31 January 2027, filing early helps ensure your entire journey stays within MTD software and gives us more time to spot and resolve any issues — keeping your experience smooth, consistent, and fully aligned with MTD

If you or your client signed up to test MTD for Income Tax for either the 2024 to 2025 or 2025 to 2026 tax years, then you can get support from HMRC’s dedicated customer support team. They can help with any queries that you have in relation to those tax years.

Spotlight: shaping the future: MTD director looks back on beta

MTD for Income Tax: building momentum, learning fast and moving forward  

As we head towards the biggest change to Income Tax Self-Assessment  in 30 years, it’s worth pausing to reflect on the journey so far, especially the achievements of the MTD beta testing and what they mean for customers, agents and everyone involved in this transformation.  

A beta with real depth and real world impact  

When we launched the beta, we set out to test the service at scale and with genuine diversity, and we did exactly that.  

One of the standout achievements was sheer volume, with more than 15,000 quarterly updates submitted through the service. That level of real world engagement gave us the kind of insight you simply can’t gain from theory alone. We’ve also seen over 170,000 sign-ups with 93.9% completion rates.  

But numbers alone weren’t the real triumph. What truly marked the beta as a success was the support from industry. We saw a wide range of software products being used, including providers offering free options, giving customers real choice and reflecting the growing maturity of the software market. We’ve also built our internal customer and compliance capabilities to ensure customers get the right support at the right time. That overall collaboration across the ecosystem within HMRC and with key partners has been vital to shaping what comes next.

Surprises, lessons and moments that changed our thinking  

There were positive surprises throughout the beta, along with learning moments that helped refine our approach. The depth of engagement from customers and agents, particularly the quality of feedback,  was a major positive. We learned not just what was working, but why, and what needed to evolve. We also had great external help from professional bodies, software developers and real customers and agents who have reached out.  

Shaped by customers and agents — in all the best ways  

If there’s one theme that runs through the beta experience, it’s this: feedback changed the service, significantly.  

We streamlined the signup journey. We removed friction points like only requesting an employment start date if it’s within the last two years. And we refined key processes, for example shifting the allocation of cash or accrual accounting to the end of the year (though still chosen upfront), making the experience more intuitive and less burdensome.

We also improved connected services, such as the Agent Services Account and the signup flow, and view and change capabilities. These changes didn’t come from a meeting room, they came from real users, testing a real system.

How this learning shapes the full rollout  

The beta has already had a massive influence on the wider rollout. We identified issues early, shared learning across teams and partners, and ensured APIs are functioning as expected. It allowed us to test the critical capabilities the full system will rely on,  

This means we head towards April with confidence, momentum and a clear roadmap.

What customers and agents can expect next

We’re now firmly moving from awareness to action. Letters are going out to customers with turnover above £50,000 who filed by the deadline — our first cohort taking the next step into the new system.  

MTD is the biggest shift in Income Tax Self-Assessment in 30 years. 

 What matters is that everyone understands their new responsibilities. They need to use compatible software to:  

• create, store and correct digital records of your self-employment and property income and expenses     

• send their quarterly updates to HMRC     

• submit their tax return and pay tax due by 31 January the following year   

We expect strong early signup and anticipate over 100,000 to 200,000 customers on MTD by April, with most completing quarterly updates by the first deadline on 7 August.  

This won’t be a perfect transition and we don’t expect it to be. But we do expect good engagement and we’ll support customers every step of the way.

A  vision for the next few years  

Looking ahead, the focus is clear: continual learning, encouraging early action and helping customers get things right from the start.  

But beyond that, there’s huge potential. We’re excited to see more sole traders integrating tax as a natural part of running their business — using software not just for compliance, but to unlock wider productivity benefits. That’s where real transformation happens.

A huge thank you

Finally, to everyone who made the beta a success: a massive thank you.

To the beta team and customer support colleagues, to everyone across HMRC who has contributed, and just as importantly, to our partners, software providers, representative bodies, accountants, tax agents, bookkeepers — the list goes on.  

Your support, collaboration and perseverance have brought us to this moment. And together, we’re ready for April, and ready to make MTD a genuine step forward for the tax system.

Useful information  

Check if you need to use this service to report your self-employment and property income and find out more about exemptions for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax at use Making Tax Digital for Income Tax.

We’d love your feedback  

Take our short survey (under 5 minutes).  

Thank you for being part of the MTD testing team. Your involvement is shaping the future of Making Tax Digital.