Scrooges opt to spend Christmas day filing tax returns
Surprising number of people say on Christmas day: 'Never mind the turkey, here's my tax return'
Scrooge-like taxpayers spent Christmas day filing their tax returns,
Accountancy Age has learnt, with 84 people deciding to spend 25 December filing.
The figure was revealed by HM Revenue & Customs this week, showing a fall
on last year, when more than 200 returns were filed.
Nearly 3,000 battled hangovers to file returns on New Year’s Day, the
department added.
‘There’s been a bit of Dunkirk spirit on the filing at the end of the year,’
said an HMRC spokesman.
The deadline for filing falls at the end of January, so the Christmas respite
may have been a sensible time to get the returns in ahead of time.
The filings followed another call from HMRC for returns to be sent in during
quieter periods to avoid bogging down its IT systems.
HMRC has predicted a 30% rise in online self assessment filing by 31 January,
having hit two million online returns last year. Over a quarter of a million
filed in the last five days up to the 31 January deadline, which peaked at 8,700
returns per hour during the period.