Martin Black

This query relates to a bear trust that was set up my my (now deceased) father for my son, of which I am a trustee. At this point can I just state that I have never done a tax return. I have always and still am PAYE. I appreciate ignorance isn’t necessary a plea, but…. So. I was directed to register the above trust with HMRC a couple of years ago, which I duly did. I received a letter in early 2023 requesting that I submit a tax return for the years 2022-23. I went online to try to do this, and having entered the UTR etc it revealed that there was £0 tax to pay. Great I thought. That was simple. There were no obvious further steps needed. A few months later I received notification of a £100 fine for late submission of the return. Somewhat confused I tried to unsuccessfully call HMRC to discuss but, for anyone who has tried this, it’s virtually impossible to get through to anyone. I sent a letter explaining there was £0 tax to pay so this fine must be incorrect. Some weeks later I received a threatening letter telling me again to pay the fine for late submission. I reluctantly paid and assumed that was the end of the matter. I had no further communication regarding this. I recently received instructions to submit a return for the 2023-24 period, and once again went online to do this and was once again given a £0 figure. Having had the £100 fine I was somewhat wary but again, there was no obvious was of going any further unless I paid to download some accounting software??? I called HMRC and finally got through to someone who suggested the best course of action was to submit a paper return, and “oh by the way, you’ve not done 2022-23 yet, I’ll send you both of these” (no mention of any potential fine) Again, these forms are utterly confusing but I believe they were filled out correctly and posted back to HMRC using a tracked method. Yesterday I received a letter stating that my return for 2022-23 is more than 3 months late and I could be liable to a fine of £900!!!! This is utterly terrifying and I really can’t afford to pay this. My stress levels are through the roof. What can I do about this?