VAT Return make up

[davidmonks]

How do I review what transactions have been included to make up a draft VAT Return as my VAT Report is coming up with strange numbers?

[rhc]

Hi,

VAT Return Help

No problem! With cash accounting, it takes the payment date of the invoices rather than the invoice date. So if you have any invoices that are not paid in any way, then these wouldn’t count. On the VAT return itself, you have an “Export” button at the top of the page. This details all invoices, and in the case of cash accounting, all payments that have been included.

Hope this helps

[davidmonks]

Thanks for pointing me in the direction of the Export button - I had assumed this would just give me a version of the report rather than the details.
Follow up question then is how to I remove values which shouldn’t be included in the calculations?

[rhc]

Maybe this helpful:

How do VAT errors get adjusted on return I want to delete a sale

Can’t see where how to adjust vat returns. I’ve got a sale invoice for vat only which the net sum is on another invoice previously submitted on last vat return. I put the whole thing on this latest return because I can’t do a vat only invoice. Now I need to delete the entry from the previous vat return.

[davidmonks]

Hi rhc and apologies for going on but I should have made my point more clearly. Let me try again.
It has been my practice up until now not to use the QF process to generate my VAT Report but to, in essence, export the relevant details into Excel and then determine which of the relevant invoices have been paid in the period (or missed from inclusion in the prior period!) and then submitted my return accordingly via HMRC’s website manually.
I’m now exploring MTD and decided I would run the QF VAT Report to see whether it gets close to the last return submitted. It doesn’t - in fact it is nowhere near - as it is including all transactions since the year dot rather than those which fall within the period dates I’ve inputted. How can I ensure that only the relevant values/dates are included?

[Paul_Courtier]

There is a setting where you can change the date that quickfile starts to look for payments or invoices, set it to whatever date you need.

As a side note I should point out that it’s not suprisng it doesn’t match what you’ve submitted if you’ve played around with the figures prior to submission.

The other issue you will now have moving forward in quickfile is adjusting for all the adjustments you made manually.

[davidmonks]

Paul,
Do you know where I can find the setting you refer to to change the lookup date for payments or invoices?

[Paul_Courtier]

I believe its under vat settings. Although I have seen when creating a vat return there is sometimes a notice at the top telling you the date it’s set to and you can click that to change it.

[ian_roberts]

@davidmonks

(or missed from inclusion in the prior period!)

This is precisely what you’re seeing in the QuickFile figures - QuickFile includes in a VAT return any items (invoices/purchases if you’re on accrual accounting, payments if you’re on cash accounting) that happened on or before the end date of the quarter and have not already been accounted for in a previous return. This is to ensure that anything entered late gets dealt with as soon as possible.

If you set your VAT start date as described by @Paul_Courtier then that puts a cap on the earliest date to which QuickFile will look back for late entries.