Send quarterly updates
How and when to send quarterly updates and what’s included in them.
Every 3 months, your compatible software will add together your digital records for each business that you have. This creates totals for your self-employment and property income and expenses. These are known as quarterly updates — they are summaries, not tax returns.
You need to send your quarterly updates to HMRC every 3 months for each self-employment and property business you have.
You do not need to make any accounting or tax adjustments before sending a quarterly update.
The update periods and deadlines are set out in this guidance, and your software will tell you when and how to send updates.
Your quarterly updates will include totals for each income and expense category you’ve used for your self-employment and property income.
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax uses the same income and expense categories as Self Assessment. You can read more about the categories you should use in the Quarterly update direction for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax.
HMRC will not receive details of individual digital records, such as a receipt or invoice.
Each quarterly update covers from the start of the tax year to the end of the update period. They are automatically worked out by your software for you to check before you send them.
If you have not received any income or incurred any expenses during the last update period, you must still send your quarterly update to tell HMRC.
After you’ve sent an update
After sending an update, you’ll be able to get an estimate of your tax bill for your self-employment and property income in your software, or in your HMRC online services account. As part of your estimate, HMRC will include any other information it already has.
For example, if you are repaying either a student or postgraduate loan, your plan or loan type is added automatically to calculate your loan repayments. You can find out more about telling HMRC about a student or postgraduate loan in your tax return.
Your estimate will be less accurate if you have other income sources that you have not told HMRC about yet, or if your accounting period does not match the tax year.
Other income sources
Depending on which software product you use and the income sources you have, you may be able to add other income sources in your software during the tax year, for example, savings interest.
These other income sources will not be included in your quarterly updates, but if you choose to record them in your software during the tax year you will get a more complete view of your tax affairs. This is because the tax bill estimate you see when you send a quarterly update will include this income.
For example, if you’re a landlord that is employed and also has income from savings interest, your tax bill estimate would be based on your:
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property income and expenses, when you send those totals in your quarterly updates
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employment income (PAYE) added by HMRC
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income from savings interest, if you choose to add it
If you cannot record other income sources in your software during the tax year, or choose not to, you will need to add them before you submit your tax return.
For jointly let properties, in your quarterly updates you can choose to include either:
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property income and expenses
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property income only
If you choose not to include your expenses for jointly let properties, you must report them after the end of the tax year. You do this by resending your fourth quarterly update before you submit your tax return.
If you also solely own other properties, you need to include both property income and expenses for those properties in your quarterly updates.
There are 2 types of update periods for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax:
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standard update periods — these align to the tax year (6 April to 5 April)
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calendar update periods — these cover the period from 1 April to 31 March and end on the last day of the month
The dates your update period covers depends on if you use standard or calendar update periods, but the deadline to send your update is the same.
Each time you send a quarterly update it will cover from the start of the tax year to the end of the update period, not just the previous three months. This means you can correct your records without having to resend previous updates.
If you have an agent, they can tell you which update period to use if you’re not sure.
Standard update periods
If your accounting period aligns with the tax year (6 April to 5 April), you should use standard update periods.
This table shows the dates for the standard update periods alongside the quarterly update deadlines.
| Standard update period | Update deadline |
|---|---|
| 6 April to 5 July | 7 August |
| 6 April to 5 October | 7 November |
| 6 April to 5 January | 7 February |
| 6 April to 5 April | 7 May (the following tax year) |
Calendar update periods
If your accounting period covers 1 April to 31 March, you should consider using calendar update periods. This will make your record keeping simpler.
You will need to select calendar update periods for each source of income in your software before you send your first quarterly update. Calendar update periods will continue to apply unless you decide to change back to standard update periods.
You cannot change the update periods you’re using for a tax year after you have sent a quarterly update.
This table shows dates for the calendar update periods alongside the quarterly update deadlines.
| Calendar update period | Update deadline |
|---|---|
| 1 April to 30 June | 7 August |
| 1 April to 30 September | 7 November |
| 1 April to 31 December | 7 February |
| 1 April to 31 March | 7 May (the following tax year) |
You do not have to send your update on the day of the deadline. You can send a quarterly update any time from the end of the update period to the update deadline.
You can also send an update up to 10 days before the end of the update period if you do not expect to record any further transactions.
For example, you may be going on holiday and know that you will not be working for the rest of the period and will receive no further income.
If you miss quarterly update deadlines you may get a late submission penalty — these are points based. If you reach a penalty point threshold, you’ll get a £200 penalty.
The point thresholds depend on whether you’re required to use Making Tax Digital for Income Tax or you’re volunteering.
2026 to 2027 tax year
HMRC will not apply penalty points for late quarterly updates during the 2026 to 2027 tax year.
You will need to send your quarterly updates before you are able to submit your tax return.
Penalty points will still apply for late tax returns for this tax year.
After the 2026 to 2027 tax year
If you do not send your quarterly update by the relevant deadline, you will get a late submission penalty point. If you reach 4 points, you’ll get a £200 penalty. Penalty points will also apply for late tax returns.
You can find out more about penalties for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax.
If you’re a volunteer
Penalties do not apply to late quarterly updates whilst you’re volunteering for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax.
Penalty points still apply for late tax returns. If you reach 2 points, you’ll get a £200 penalty.
You can find out more about penalties if you’re volunteering for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax.
You can choose to send updates more often. Most compatible software will allow you to send an update on any day.
For example, you may want to understand how a significant business receipt or expense affects your estimated tax bill.
If you choose to send updates more often, they still need to cover the full update period. For example, instead of sending one quarterly update covering 6 July to 5 October, you could choose to send 3 separate updates covering:
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6 April to 5 August
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6 April to 5 September
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6 April to 5 October
You may need to resend your fourth quarterly update if you need to make any changes to your digital records. This could be because you need to:
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make corrections to your records if you’ve identified an error
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record joint property income expenses (if you did not include these in earlier updates)
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record Rent-a-Room income (if you decided to claim Rent-a-Room relief after the end of the tax year)
If needed, you should resend your fourth quarterly update before you make any tax adjustments. You can find out more about what digital records you need to create and when.
After you have sent your final quarterly update for the tax year, you should check if you need to make any adjustments to your self-employment and property income.