ROS, PAYE Modernisation & Limited Companies

retalivity

I am an IT contractor with my own Ltd Company. I had employed an accountant to do my monthly payroll, PAYE/VAT returns etc., however I switched to a new company in November/December as I had a number of issues with the previous crowd.
Switched to a new accountant, promising the world etc., however since the start of the year they have been very hard to get hold off, and while apparently submitting my payslips there is nothing on ROS about it and no money has been deducted. They have been telling me (feels like fobbing off tbh) that issues with PAYE modernisation have been causing delays with revenue, hence the delay, however I am not convinced. I submitted my own VAT3 return in January through ROS, and the money was deducted a few days later. However, no PAYE deduction has been taken since December - This was usually deducted monthly from the company account. I have tried ringing revenue myself but have ended up on hold for 20 mins before hanging up, and their hours are pretty narrow.
Questions are:
Am I right to be suspicious that nothing has been deducted in over months?
Am I liable if this continues, and should I just bin the new new guys and get a proper accountant in (suggestions welcome!)?
While not an accountant, I do calculate my own tax on a monthly basis alongside previous accountants and it marries up exactly for the most part. SO should I just do my own monthly payroll and VAT and get an accountant in for the year-end stuff?

Thanks

Happy4all

What was the frequency of the old p30s last year? Monthly? Quarterly?

retalivity

Monthly.

I guess i'm wondering is there anyone else in the same situation where they are experiencing delays with revenue taking paye payments?

bbbaldy

If they put your payday as the 1st of feb. It will be considered a feb return not january. Had this issue myself. Called revenue , they said no problem.

Stratvs

Overall we have not encountered any material issues with PAYE Modernisation since 01/01/19. There have been no delays in upload/download/processing that we've encountered ( or anyone we know ). Also once we file a payroll run it appears on the ROS employer interface within minutes.

If your pay is processed monthly the January pay would only go for payment to Revenue now, end Feb. In fact our Jan payroll PAYE/PRSI was just taken from bank yesterday. If you have a variable DD set up then the actual liability for January will be taken now so you may not have seen a January payment ( unless you were on dd last year and the December 2018 would have been taken in January 2019 )

As other poster said, if your Jan payment was paid 01/02 then it would go into Feb and the Revenue payment wouldn't be until end March. However that's easy to check, what date in January did you take a payment ? If there was a payment in January there should be a payroll run in January filed on ROS.

It is not difficult or expensive to do yourself. There are many low cost payroll packages out there. You already have a digital cert from doing the VAT so you're set up to do the payroll also.

If you have been paid since 01/01/19 and a Payroll Submission Report (PSR) has not been filed on ROS on or before the payment you are exposed to penalties. This needs sorting ASAP. Yes, most accountants/payroll bureaux were busy setting up for the change but it all went pretty well from what I can see.

retalivity

I was told my dec hrs, paid in january, were done by my accountant. However, logging into ros and checking recent payroll runs, there was nothing there.
So i ended up doing it myself in feb 1st - dec hrs usually paid in jan - so i guess if what you say above holds for me, this should come out today/this week?

I also did jan hrs paid in feb in feb 12th myself, before the accountant came back to me with excuses/reasons. Possible this comes out today as well then i guess...

Still, when i check ros, the only payroll submissions are the ones i did myself

Rulmeq

Don't pay an accountant to do your day-to-day stuff. Get a payroll package (I use payback, it's about €100 per year, but there's plenty of others out there, and the yall work seemlessly with PAYE modernisation). Also if you're an IT contractor with just yourself as the only employee you probably should have been doing P30s quarterly (it cut down on paperwork, and also helped with cashflow - but probably too late to change now if you were monthly before). It also means you are in control, you're not relying on anyone else, and you can be confident that you have done it (and in the 10 years I've used it, the only discrpencies were a few cents from rounding)

Stratvs

retalivity wrote: »

I was told my dec hrs, paid in january, were done by my accountant. However, logging into ros and checking recent payroll runs, there was nothing there.
So i ended up doing it myself in feb 1st - dec hrs usually paid in jan - so i guess if what you say above holds for me, this should come out today/this week?

I also did jan hrs paid in feb in feb 12th myself, before the accountant came back to me with excuses/reasons. Possible this comes out today as well then i guess...

Still, when i check ros, the only payroll submissions are the ones i did myself

It appears in the absence of a payroll package that you've used the ROS online facility to input payroll. While that is available for cases such as you it's not a substitute for a payroll package as it does not compute pay/tax/prsi/usc. You have to have the relevant pay and deductions amounts ready and then input them. So you basically have to go through the process that a payroll package would use anyway to get the amounts needed.

If you've inputted payment dates in February then payment will not be due until March. But Revenue will only take payment if you have either a variable DD set up or if you go in yourself and pay the amount using a ROS Debit Instruction. You need to see if a variable DD is set up. You or your accountant would have had to initiate that process and it was only available to set up after last 23/01/19 so it's questionable if that's in place from what you said.

Rulmeq wrote: »

Don't pay an accountant to do your day-to-day stuff. Get a payroll package

Agreed.

namenotavailablE

In 2019, Brightpay (I'm in now way affiliated with the company) is offering a totally free version of their software for single employee scenarios:

https://www.brightpay.ie/pricing/ (see lower left corner of screen for free version)

retalivity

So money came out of the business account today, the amount from my submission for january (done in feb). Rang revenue after lunch, managed to get talking to someone who squared off the state of employments, payrolls submitted etc. The only ones present are the ones i submitted, there is nothing there from the accountant, and duplicate employees have been fixed. So it appears all is fixed.

That said, i will fire these cowboys i currently have as accountants, and do it myself. I dont have any payropl software (yet), ive been calculating the tax due using excel sheets and formulas, and its pretty bang on. Im pretty sure i am owed tax from overpaying last year, but not sure how i get my p60 as i switched accountants in nov and the new guys are non-responsive.

Will have a look at brightpay as well, cheers.

Stratvs

retalivity wrote: »

but not sure how i get my p60 as i switched accountants in nov and the new guys are non-responsive.

Provided your company’s p35 for 2018 has been filed the data you need will be on that. Check on ROS.

retalivity

Nope, doesn't appear to have been filed, or I cannot find it on ROS.

Stratvs

retalivity wrote: »

Nope, doesn't appear to have been filed, or I cannot find it on ROS.

It sounds like you’ve fallen between two stools with your agents. The p35 is overdue. If you don’t have the 2018 payroll data you need to get that from whichever agent was supposed to be handling it and get it filed ASAP.

Check outstanding returns in ROS. It’ll be listed there if it’s not filed.