Can someone please point me in the direction of the least resistance in answering a question regarding the dialog notice displayed on the VAT filing return page relating to “First Return Start Date”.
Basically I have changed the start date and it appears to make no difference to the vat quarter date range or values, so is this notice significant or just information I can overlook… – I have read the “VAT Return Guide” and its explanation [to me at least] is confusing, do I understand correctly that with the first filing submission QuickFile pulls in all past transactions unless you set the start date relating to the beginning of the vat quarter being filed…?
For example, I am filing last quarter of 2022, my confusion is the date range for that quarter is already set so should QuickFile not just be pulling in transactions for that period. I assume I should set the start date to 1st October 2022, would that be correct…?
All advice/comments greatly appreciated.
Thank you.
The way QuickFile VAT returns work, when you submit the return for a given quarter it will include all items (invoices/purchases if you’re on accrual accounting, payments if you’re on cash accounting) that are dated on or before the end of that quarter and not already included in a previous QuickFile VAT return. It is designed like this so that if you submit the return for a given quarter but then subsequently discover additional items that you missed off that should have been included (maybe a supplier invoiced you late or something like that), then you can enter those items with their correct dates and they will be accounted for as soon as possible in the next available return without you having to do anything specific.
The “VAT start date” setting is a hard stop on how far back that “dated before the end of this quarter” search will go. You should set that to the first day of the first quarter that you want to file, so that items you already dealt with outside of QuickFile do not get claimed twice.