davbut

I received an email today inviting me to sign up for the testing phase of MTD for ITSA, I guess for the tax year April 2025-2026 before it becomes mandatory (for my level of income) in April 2026-27, although the email wasn't specific. I use FreeAgent. They confirmed today that they are still beta testing functionality and are unable to facilitate early adoption. They do not have a release date. FreeAgent, along with QuickBooks, Xero, Sage Business Cloud Accounting and Zoho Books are supposedly top-rated MTD software options and likely to command a large percentage of the market share. a) Does anyone know if the other accountancy packages above support early adoption? b) It's concerning that a leading supplier like FreeAgent is unable to do so. c) How will HMRC support sole traders in the event of tech problems after MTD for ITSA becomes mandatory (for some) in 2026. Although I have no objection to the goals of MTD for ITSA, it feels like it's being rushed through and that 2026 is an unrealistic target. There are multiple errors, omissions and glaring falsehoods in the policy supporting MTD for ITSA, specifically the financial burden of adoption and ongoing costs. Meaningless and unactionable statements like "HMRC strongly encourages all software providers to produce a free version of their software." The government and HMRC need to extract their collective head from the sand and not be directly responsible for a situation where they lose the goodwill of those affected.