Making Tax Digital - software pilots and testing - Avalara

In 2018, UK’s HMRC launched a series of test pilots for its new Making Tax Digital VAT filing process. Making Tax Digital goes live on 1 April 2019, and will require all UK VAT registered businesses to file their quarterly returns via HMRC’s API platform.

The pilot commenced on 11 April 2018. This is a private pilot, with a number of software providers being invited to test their solutions with HMRC and then receiving HMRC formal approval upon successful test filing.

HMRC has staggered the tax payer categories that may be tested in the following pilots:

Launch month	Tax payers category
Oct 2017	HMRC release application programming interfaces (APIs) which provide details of the data to be filed, and end points
Apr 2018 pilot launch	Private testing: Tax payers with the simplest returns. This means basic domestic sales and purchases for VAT trasactions
Nov 2018	Tax payers with EC dispatches and arrivals
Dec 2018	Public sector bodies with VAT filings
Early 2019	Public testing phase
Apr 2019	Launch with MTD filing requirements for all VAT payers above the VAT registration threshold