Preparing myself for Making Tax Digital?

I have looked at a number of options but I only have 5 residential and one commercial property, plus pension income, and most programs are designed for larger investors or small businesses and have features that I don't use, such as invoicing and VAT recording. SmartPropertyManager.com is awful, very clunky and does not handle other income, such as pension payments.

The best I've come across is APARI but you really have to input each transaction manually (you can split them into income and expense) and I can't link my bank account as I don't have one just for rental income and expenses.

You can upload from a .csv file but I gave up on that as I had to break down every transaction on BankTree (a clunky and very poor substitute for the much-missed Quicken) into the various categories my accountant currently uses and that just makes a mess of BankTree.

I toyed with Excel, which I use for budgeting and planning, but APARI is probably easier. They have a help desk which respond quickly, even if you are only using the trial version. However, I will look at Coconut, and I have asked for advice from my accountant, although it seems that that may not be necessary for a few more years!

Reply to the comment left by Laura Delow at 19/12/2022 - 12:05
I am in that position as well.

Reply to the comment left by Jerry stone at 19/12/2022 - 14:01It's extremely frustrating isn't it, cause if there's no software developed to accommodate Partnerships & multi income streams & you have rental income from a partnership, dividend income from your own jointly owned Ltd Co, self employed earned income for you + partner & pension income possibly for you both, it could mean anywhere up to 10 quarterly returns & 10 annual returns totalling 50 returns per annum (if there's 2 of you then per quarter; a partnership return plus x 2 individual rental income returns, a Ltd Co return, x 2 dividend income returns, x 2 pension income returns if in receipt of pension income and x 2 self employed income returns). Horrendous!!!

Not sure I'd use anything that's just fallen of a tree. 😉

From Accountingweb:
Treasury delays MTD ITSA for two more years

The Treasury this afternoon confirmed a two-year delay to the Making Tax Digital for income tax (MTD ITSA) timetable.

19th Dec 2022
51 comments
First Secretary to the Treasury issued a written statement confirming the changes at lunchtime on Monday 19 December.

“The government understands businesses and self-employed individuals are currently facing a challenging economic environment, and that the transition to MTD for ITSA represents a significant change for taxpayers, their agents, and for HMRC,” the minister wrote.

To maximise the benefits of MTD for small business, the government opted to allow more time to prepare, “so that all businesses, self-employed individuals, and landlords within scope of MTD for Income Tax, but particularly those with the smallest incomes, can adapt to the new ways of working.”

The hotly anticipated MTD ITSA reset was inadvertently revealed shortly after 9am on Wednesday 14 December in a gov.uk post announcing an extension to the MTD ITSA pilot scheme that was taken down shortly afterwards. Update emails were also sent detailing the extension.

The timetable change followed weeks of urgent calls from professional bodies such as the CIOT, HMRC’s own Administrative Burdens Advisory Board, tax software representatives and practitioners.

Bowing to the inevitable, financial secretary to the Treasury Victoria Atkins released a a ministerial statement setting out adjustments to the scope and timing of MTD ITSA:

A two-year delay until April 2026 for mandatory MTD ITSA filing.
Minimum income reporting level increased to £50,000, with those earning more than £30,000 mandated to join the scheme in 2027.
The situation for landlords and sole traders earning less than £30,000 will be reviewed to see if MTD ITSA can be shaped to meet the needs of smaller businesses;
Partnerships will not be brought into MTD for ITSA as previously planned in 2025.
Points-based penalty system to be extended to MTD ITSA filers when they join.
While Atkins said the government remains committed to introducing MTD for ITSA to partnerships at a later date, the decision on when they might join the scheme will be taken at a later date, as for those on less than £30,000.

To many involved in UK tax, it seems like we’ve been here before. After her appointment in October, Atkins took her time to get on top of the brief, but ultimately bowed to advice and pressure from all directions that MTD ITSA was not ready to be introduced in its current form by April 2024.

The last time the Treasury faced such a unified chorus was last year, when the previous FST Lucy Frazer announced a 12-month delay to the timetable in September 2021.

Quicken 2003 - will run on Windows 10. Use the xp compatibility feature.

Multiple ownership / reporting structures - take a look at Lendlord. Offers other property PMS functionality and uses open banking (if you want).

Most serious SMB accounting packages should be able to cope with complex structures.

Good news MTD delayed but, like the new EPC/MEES requirements, it will turn up eventually, so best to start preparations - especially if you're still
doing the annual post Xmas scramble to sort out manual records into a spreadsheet.

Improving your bookkeeping makes it less scary and gives you easy access to data, allowing you to manage your business better.

I'm going to do nothing until the last min. Taking my lead from those apparently in control of the country......

HMRC do provide a list of MTD compliant software. If you register with HMRC, they will send you the latest information.

I am using Apari. It does what I need to do well which is dealing with joint ownership between myself and my wife.
Downsides include:-
-amount of time to input/amend records, even when using the csv import functionality
-its still early days. I suspect the vendor is reluctant to spend huge amounts of money developing a great product in the knowledge of possible HMRC delays
-once you have submitted your return, you cannot amend through Apari... you have to write to HMRC

Upsides include:-
-I now have all my records and documents in a proper database.
-deals very well with joint ownership structure
-I can export to Excel and analyse my tax records therefore improving accuracy and providing analysis of my property business.

Overall, I like Apari and chose them because of the joint ownership facility and the enforced discipline, however, be ready to spend lots of time to start with and then for a higher burden of ongoing record keeping.

Reply to the comment left by Andrew Dove at 19/12/2022 - 19:35
Thanks Andrew for your comments on APARI, I may take on a subscription and explore further. It seems to do what I need but I realise that there are people with much larger portfolios with a more complex set-up. I had started inputting data from 6 April but that will take some time so may just wait still next April.