Closing and reporting VAT periods

Businesses that are liable for VAT are obliged to submit a tax return. This must be submitted by the end of each VAT period, and the frequency depends on the number of VAT periods that your company has chosen to have. Read more in Change number of VAT periods.

Tip! The deadlines for submission of tax returns and payment of VAT can be found at www.hmrc.gov.uk (external link).

Before closing a VAT period

Before you close a VAT period, it is important that you ensure that all entries for the relevant VAT period have been entered and transferred to Financials. It is also important to ensure that all accounting periods in the VAT period have been closed before the VAT period can be closed.

At the end of the first period in a new year and when the previous accounting year has not been completed, you should ensure that the partially closed accounts process has been used before period 1 is closed. Read more in Partially Close Accounts.

Closing a VAT period

In Mamut Business Software a VAT period is automatically closed when the last accounting period in the VAT period is closed. The VAT Liability account (2202) is the account that VAT amounts are transferred into when closing a financial period. This is something the program does automatically when running the VAT period end procedure.

At Year End there cannot be any balance on any other VAT accounts besides account 2202. The balance on account 2202 will be on the opening balance for the following year. For more information about this, please consult your accountant.

Tip! Separate rules apply when closing periods 3, 6, 9 and 12 because these typically also mark the end of a VAT Quarter. When you close one of these periods, the VAT return will automatically be printed. A wizard takes you through the procedure for approval of VAT returns.

Tip! The program will automatically save a PDF copy of the day-book in the document directory, so that you can easily access this again if there are problems with the printed copy. You will find a list over these via File - Database Utilities - Go to the Company database's document directory. Then open the Documents folder followed by the Journals folder.

How to close a VAT period

Select View - Accounting - Period End.
Select which Period of which Accounting year you want to close, and then click Next.
Note! If the VAT period (accounting period) you wish to close, is greyed out, it means that the corresponding accounting period has not been closed. This must be closed first.
The VAT report will now be printed. Check that the report is correct.
Click Complete to approve if everything is correct.
Note! If there is an error in the VAT report, it is important that you click Cancel so that the report is not approved. Then make the necessary corrections, and close the period once again.
Once you have approved the VAT report, it will be processed and printed automatically.

The chosen period has now been closed.

Note! When you have selected to close a period, you lose the opportunity to create, edit or delete journals for this period. Also be aware that you cannot re-open a closed period.

Submission of tax return and payment of VAT

After the end of each VAT period, you must send in the tax return. This can be submitted either online or by paper. If the tax return shows that you owe tax, this must be paid within the same deadline as that for submission of the tax return.

Tip! You will find more information about completing the tax return and deadlines for completion at www.hmrc.gov.uk(external link).