Their Dates. Your Checklist. — Free PDF Guide

HMRC doesn't send reminders. It just sends penalties.

Miss the 31 January deadline by a single day and it's £100. Automatically. No appeal, no warning, no grace. There are eight deadlines a UK sole trader needs to know — and most people only know one of them.

This guide covers all eight.

WHAT'S INSIDE

• 6 April — New Tax Year Starts What resets, what carries forward, and what you need to do before you do anything else.
• 5 October — Register for Self Assessment If this is your first year, this deadline exists and most people miss it. It's earlier than you think.
• 31 October — Paper Return Deadline Included for completeness. Almost nobody files on paper. If you're not sure which applies to you, the answer is almost certainly online.
• 31 January — Online Return + Tax Payment The big one. Your return and your tax payment, same deadline, same day. Plus a first-year warning most freelancers don't see coming.
• 31 July — Payment on Account A second tax payment in summer that arrives six months after the January bill. Set it aside the moment you file. That gap is not free money.
• Quarterly — Making Tax Digital If MTD applies to you, there are four more deadlines per year on top of all of the above.
• Watch out — VAT Registration A separate threshold, a separate regime, and a rolling 12-month window that can catch you out mid-year.
• Reference — Miss This, Pay This Every automatic penalty in one table. Know what's at stake before you miss something.

THIS IS FOR YOU IF...

• You went self-employed recently and you're not completely sure what HMRC expects from you, or when
• You know 31 January exists but you're less confident about the other seven
• You want something you can actually tick off, not another page of GOV.UK guidance

Free to download.

Legal Disclaimer

ScatteredOS is an organisational workspace and reference tool. It is not accounting software, tax software, or a regulated financial service. All deadline dates and figures in this guide are based on publicly available HMRC information verified March 2026. Dates are the same each tax year but HMRC may change them — always verify at gov.uk before acting on anything time-sensitive. Your accountant can advise on your specific circumstances.

Full legal terms: payhip.com/ScatteredOS/legal-disclaimer-limitation-of-liability