PayPerShop Forum

Hi,

I’m trying to e-file P46’s for new starters on my payroll this month using 3rd party payroll software.
My problem is encountered under the new procedure for sending P46’s that have not been completed by the employee:

Quote from E13 (Employers Help Book) regarding new procedures for filing P46

Exceptionally, if your employee has not completed the form P46, or provided you with the information to fully complete Section one in time for their first pay day, you must complete Section one to the best of your knowledge on their behalf and use code BR on a cumulative basis. You must send in a P46 for all cases on the employee’s first pay day. Prepare a form P11 when you first pay your employee.

However, when I try to send the P46 without any statement ticked my payroll software gave an xml generation error; when queried with our software provider they have stated that this is now part of the specification from HMRC that the P46 can’t be sent electronically without one of the statements being ticked.

Under the new specifications, the only way for the P46 to be sent electronically with code BR and a statement ticked would seem to suggest that I should tick statement C on the employee’s behalf!

Has anyone else come across this problem?

Keith

From April 2008, HMRC has introduced the validation routines for in-year forms that will used when in-year online filing becomes mandatory for many employees in April 2009. One of those, as you have discovered, is that a P46 will not be accepted online unless it is fully completed. This means that, if the employee has not ticked one of the three statements A, B or C, then you have to tick statement C and apply tax code BR.

When you think about it, this is only what an employer must already do in the paper P46 scenario. If no statements are ticked by the employee, the employer must apply tax code BR - so the online procedure is only formalising that requirement.

On HMRC Online there is a forth option which you can tick in this case that says neither statements A, B or C have been completed therefore getting around this problem. Maybe the software developers should include this option somewhere.