The end of year Real Time Information (RTI) PAYE submissions should have all been made by 19 April 2015 at latest. Although HMRC does give a three day grace period. What happens if you don't report your payroll information on time? HMRC may well charge a penalty.

Penalties are charged when a Full Payment Submission (FPS) or Employment Payment Summary (EPS) are submitted late, however no penalties apply were there are mitigating circumstances. This is where things get extremely complicated:

HMRC says that it won’t charge a penalty if:

  • a FPS is late but all reported payments on the FPS are within 3 days of your employees’ payday (this applies from 6 March 2015 to 5 April 2016)
  • you’re a new employer and you sent your first within 30 days of paying an employee
  • it’s your first failure in the tax year to send a report on time (this doesn’t apply to employers who register with annual scheme or have fewer than 50 employees for the tax year 2014 to 2015)

There are actually some eight other situations where you file late (according to HMRC), see our guide to RTI penalties for a breakdown.