When does Making Tax Digital start for you?
Two questions. Your figures, not ours. We show the threshold rule in full, including the part most people get wrong, because a tax date you cannot check is worth nothing.
HMRC add the two together. That is the single most misread line in the whole rule, and it is why this page asks twice.
We have nothing to go on yet - both boxes are empty. That is not the same as "Making Tax Digital does not apply to you", so we will not say it does not.
- Self-employment turnover£0
- Property income£0
- Qualifying income£0
- Threshold that catches you—
- First quarter ends—
- First update due—
- Upcoming update due—
- Three-line accounts—
The rule, in three lines
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax arrives in waves, and which wave you are in depends on one figure: your qualifying income for the last full tax year.
- Over £50,000 6 April 2026 The first wave. Already in force. This is you
- Over £30,000 6 April 2027 The second wave. This is you
- Over £20,000 6 April 2028 The third wave, and the widest. This is you
The three things people get wrong
- Added togetherQualifying income is self-employment income AND property income, summed. A sole trader turning over £30,000 with £25,000 of rent is at £55,000 and is in the first wave, though neither figure alone would have caught them.
- TurnoverIt is gross income, not profit. Your expenses do not come off before the threshold is tested, so a business with thin margins can be caught while feeling nowhere near it.
- Over, not atThe thresholds are "more than", so exactly £50,000 is not in the first wave. One pound more is.
- Quarter endsThe dates above assume the standard tax-year quarters, which end 5 July, 5 October, 5 January and 5 April. You may elect calendar quarters instead - ending 30 June, 30 September, 31 December and 31 March - and the four filing deadlines do not move if you do. BuzzozoHub keeps records on either.
Source: HMRC's Making Tax Digital for Income Tax mandation thresholds and the quarterly update deadlines of 7 August, 7 November, 7 February and 7 May. This page uses the same three thresholds and the same dates as the record-keeping engine inside BuzzozoHub itself, and a build check compares them to it, so the tool and the product cannot drift apart.
This is guidance, not tax advice, and we would rather say so. It answers one question - which wave your figures put you in - and it cannot know about the things that change an answer: a partnership, a change of accounting date, income you have not told it about, or an exemption. Your accountant can. If you do not have one, that is worth fixing before April rather than after it.
What BuzzozoHub does, and what it does not
BuzzozoHub keeps the digital records Making Tax Digital requires: every invoice and every expense captured as it happens, categorised into HMRC's own boxes, with your quarterly figures ready to read at any point in the period rather than reconstructed from a carrier bag in January.
It does not submit to HMRC. Submitting needs recognised-software status, which we have not applied for. Your figures go to your accountant, or into whichever recognised product does the filing, and they arrive already in shape. We say this on every screen that mentions Making Tax Digital, including this one, because the alternative is letting somebody assume otherwise until the deadline.
While you are here: what is your website costing you?
Tell us your website and we audit it the way Google and the new AI search engines see it: speed, mobile, findability, AI-readability. Every finding says what it is, how we fix it, and what that costs. Built by our engine, read by you in five minutes.
Automated checks of your public homepage only. No login, nothing changed, no sales call unless you ask for one.
Knowing the date is the easy half.
Fourteen days of the whole system, free. Your invoices, quotes and expenses land in one place as they happen, so when the deadline above arrives the figures are already there instead of in a carrier bag on the van floor.
No card needed. UK based, real people, and nothing on this page was sent anywhere. Or call 020 3282 5353.