posted on 16 October 2018, updated on 16 October 2018
HMRC has made the decision to delay the implementation of MTD for certain customers until 1 October 2019 to ensure there is sufficient time to test the service with them in the pilot before they are mandated to join.
The six-month deferral applies to customers who fall into one of the following categories: trusts, ‘not for profit’ organisations that are not set up as a company, VAT divisions, VAT groups, those public sector entities required to provide additional information on their VAT return (government departments, NHS trusts), local authorities, public corporations, traders based overseas, those required to make payments on account and annual accounting scheme users. The deferral will apply to around 3.5% of mandated customers.
This delay will not necessarily help local authorities that share their computer system with bodies linked to them, like an associated ALMO (unless it is large enough to make payments on account), children's trusts, trading companies, etc. So many authorities will still have the deadline of 1 April 2019 to get MDT software up and working.
More information is available from the HMRC website.