Statutory guidance

How to complete the template

Updated 22 November 2024

What to include on your return

Full management

If you have received rents for any landlords on a ‘full management’ basis, you will need to include the relevant details on your return.

Lettings only services

You may have received rents on a more limited basis.

If you collect the first month’s rent as part of a ‘letting only’ tenant-finding service, you:

• need to include these on your return
• should show the total amount of rent received from the tenant in the tax year

If you have managed the payment of rents by tenants directly to landlords, you should include this type of rental arrangement on your return. To do this, you will need to enter ‘0.00’ in the ‘Total Gross Amount Received’ column.

Rents collected

You might have received rents from tenants and then given that money to your landlord or you may not have received any rents yourselves.

You may have managed the payment of rents by tenants directly to landlords.

You need to include both types of rental arrangement on your return.

Landlords living outside of the UK

You do not need to report details of landlords living abroad who you receive rents from if you have already reported these to the Non-Resident Landlord office.

If you use commercial software to maintain your client’s property and rental information

If you are unsure how to get the data HMRC need and send it to us, you should contact your software provider and ask them how to do this.

Payments made to a landlord for the tax year

On your return you should show the gross amount received on behalf of the landlord — before any deductions are made — for:

• the year we have asked for
• each property that you manage

For example, if you manage 2 properties, you should show:

• these separately on your return
• the annual total amount for each of the properties

Including landlords that have not received payments for the tax year

You should include landlords that have not received payments for the tax year on your return.

This is because you may have not received any rent yourself, but you have may have managed the payment of rents by tenants directly to landlords. You should include this type of rental arrangement on your return.

You can do this by entering ‘0’ in the ‘Total Gross Amount Received’ column of the spreadsheet.

Landlord addresses

You should make every effort to give us contact details for all landlords.

An address should be included for all landlords. This includes landlords that have gone overseas.

Total gross amount received

In the ‘Total Gross Amount Received’ column you should include:

• the gross sum for the year received directly from the rent of property or land before deductions
• any other sums received directly from the rent

You should not enter any negative amounts in this column. If you do have a negative amount then enter ‘0.00’.

VAT

You should include VAT on your return if VAT forms part of the amount paid to your client or landlord.

Format of the return

You must submit your return in Excel format. You should follow this guidance and make sure that all columns are completed.

Your return will be rejected and remain outstanding if you submit your return in any other format.

Return for payments to non-resident landlords

If you already send HMRC a non-resident landlord return, you should continue to send that return to the relevant address. You should not include information from that return on this return.

If you do not already send HMRC a non-resident landlord return, you should include all landlords you are being asked for on this return (including any landlords that live outside the UK).

If you only deal with non-resident landlords

If you only deal with non-resident landlords and do not make a return elsewhere, you should still include all landlords you are being asked for on this return.

If you no longer run a letting business or carry out property management

You will need to complete the return up until the date your property management business ended.

Use of information

The information you give to us on your return will be used to help HMRC collect the tax which is due.

The HMRC spreadsheet

This is the only spreadsheet you can use to complete a return. HMRC will not accept reformatted versions.

You will need to download or save the spreadsheet before you input your data. If your system does not automatically download the spreadsheet, you will need to save a copy to your desktop.

When you open the spreadsheet you will need to select ‘enable editing’ to allow you to enter your data. You may also need to zoom out on the spreadsheet to make sure you complete all the relevant columns.

You should always use the most up to date HMRC spreadsheet.

Completing the spreadsheet

You must complete mandatory fields in all instances.

You must complete conditional fields where you have the data.

When completing the spreadsheet, you should not:

• amend the original structure of the spreadsheet — the spreadsheet has been designed to allow you to input your data from the first blank cell
• copy onto a blank Excel spreadsheet — this may cause issues processing the data and will result in your return being failed
• overwrite the original data entry field format — each field is in a specific format to allow processing, for example, the amount field is formatted as a number to 2 decimal places

If you need to paste data use the ‘Paste special’ option and select ‘Values’.

HMRC will use data quality software to check that the content of your return follows the appropriate format.

If the software identifies any issues with the data your return will be rejected. This means you may receive a penalty charge as HMRC views a failed return as outstanding.

Identifying errors in the data

The spreadsheet has error validation built in to help you complete your return.

If you make an error in a column, then row 1 of that column will:

• turn amber in colour
• display the total number of errors in that column
• display the number of the first row containing an error

Once you have corrected the errors, row 1 will revert back to blank white cell.

Example

Column H of the spreadsheet has errors in rows 10 and 20.

To show this, row 1 of column H:

• will turn amber
• display the number ‘2’ to show the number of errors
• display the number ‘10’ to show the row number containing the first error

When you correct row 10, the:

• total number of errors shown in row 1 will update to 1
• number of the row containing the first error will update to 20

When you correct row 20, row 1 will then update to a blank white cell.

Error validations are complex so the spreadsheet may be slow to respond when you input or correct data.

You should make sure you check your return as error validation cannot identify all potential errors.

Entering data in the spreadsheet

This section explains how to enter data into each column of the spreadsheet. You must follow the criteria for each data field.

Column A — entity’s name

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every entity you report.

You should enter the full name of the client or landlord that you received rent or managed properties on behalf of.

A landlord can be an individual, partnership or company.

If you managed payments or property on behalf of another agent then report the agent’s details as the entity.

The data must not include:

• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’
• additional words other than names, for example, ‘test’, ‘not active’

Format of the name

If the entity is an individual, the format should be either:

• title, forenames, surname — for example, ‘Mr John Edward Smith’
• title, initials, surname, with spaces left between the initials — for example, Mr J E Smith

If the entity is a company, you should enter the name of the company.

If the entity is a partnership and the partners live at:

• the same address, their information should be entered on the same row
• separate addresses and you have the individual partners’ addresses, then you must enter the information on a separate row for each partner

Column B — entity address line 1

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every entity you report.

This field cannot contain any blank spaces if you have entered an entity into column A.

You should enter the first line of the address for the entity. This must include:

• house name or number
• street

Overseas addresses can be included if they are not already reported to the HMRC non-resident department.

The data field must not include:

• a ‘care of’ address
• a ‘for the attention of’ address
• additional words other then addresses
• UK postcodes
• line breaks or carriage returns
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as, ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column C to column F — entity additional address lines 2 to 5

This is a conditional field and must be completed when you have this information.

You should only complete these fields if the entity has more than one line in their address.

If your software is unable to split addresses, we will accept a full address in column A. In these instances you can leave columns C to F blank.

The data field must not include:

• a ‘care of’ address
• a ‘for the attention of’ address
• additional words other than addresses
• UK postcodes
• line breaks or carriage returns
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column G — entity’s postcode

This is a conditional field and must be completed when you have this information.

This field cannot contain any blank spaces where an entity has been entered in Column A.

Enter the UK postcode of the reported entity.

A postcode must not exceed 8 characters. A non-UK postcode can be entered here if they do not exceed 8 characters. If the non-UK postcode exceeds 8 characters, they can be entered in the address column.

The data field must not include:

• the name of a country
• line breaks or carriage returns
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘See above’

Column H — total amount received during the year

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every entity you report.

This field cannot contain any blank spaces where an entity has been entered in column A.

You should enter the total amount of gross payments (per let property) received on behalf of the entity before any deductions.

The data must:

• only contain numerical characters
• be reported to 2 decimal places (for example, 999.00 or 750.50)
• not contain minus or negative amounts
• contain any non-numerical characters

For Guaranteed Rental Schemes enter the total gross payments made to the entity.

Jointly owned properties

It is common for property to be jointly owned by more than one individual. If the let property has co-owners, these should be entered on separate rows. You should return the names of all joint owners. If you cannot do this, report as many of them as is practical.

Including all the joint property owners will allow HMRC to match data with customer accounts.

If you know the ownership basis, you should report the actual amount received by each owner. If you do not know the ownership basis, you should split the rent equally between each landlord.

Column I — currency code

This is a conditional field.

Enter the 3-character International Organization for Standardization (ISO) currency code for the currency the reported payment was made in. You can find the relevant currency code on the ISO website.

The data must:

• be 3 characters long
• only contain alphabetical characters

No other characters will be accepted, including currency symbols.

If the reported payment in column H is 0.00, you can leave the currency code column blank.

Column J — let property address

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every entity you report.

This field cannot be blank where an entity has been entered in column A.

Enter the full let or rental address of the reported entity.

The data must not include:

• additional words
• carriage returns or line breaks
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as, ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’
• UK postcodes

Column K — let property postcode

This is a conditional field and must be completed when you have this information.

This field cannot be blank where an entity has been entered in column A.

Enter the UK postcode for every let or rental address in column J, if applicable.

The data must not:

• exceed 8 characters
• include punctuation marks or typographical symbols

Column L — tax year

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every reported entity.

This field cannot contain any blank spaces where an entity has been entered in column A.

The tax year will be the period the data relates to and requested in the data notice.

For example, for the period 06 April 2023 to 05 April 2024 the format on the spreadsheet should be — 2023/2024.

Column M — your company or organisation name

This is a mandatory field and must be completed for every reported entity.

This field cannot be blank where an entity has been entered in column A.

Enter your company or organisation name. If this differs to what is on the notice, advise us of the name change when submitting the return.

The data must not include:

• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column N — entity source reference

This is a conditional field. If you do not hold a source reference leave this column blank.

Enter the reference number from your system to identify the entity.

The data must not include:

• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column O — National Insurance number

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the relevant National Insurance number. Temporary National Insurance numbers are not applicable.

The data must be:

• between 8 and 9 characters in length (the ninth character must be either A, B, C, or D)
• in the correct format, for example AA123456A or AA123456

The data must not include:

• letters D, F, I, Q, U or V as the first or second prefix letter
• letter O as the second prefix
• the following prefix combinations, BG, GB, KN, NK, NT, TN or ZZ

Only letters and numbers will be accepted in this field. This field cannot contain any blank spaces or dividers.

Column P — entity’s Unique Taxpayer Reference

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s Unique Taxpayer Reference.

The data must be a 10-digit number, for example 1234567891.

The data must not include:

• spaces or dividers
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column Q — entity’s VAT registration number

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s VAT registration number.

The data must be no longer than 12 characters.

Column R — entity’s sort code

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s sort code.

The data must be:

• 6 characters in length
• only numerical characters
• in the correct format, for example 123456

If a sort code begins with a 0 this must be included when submitting the data.

The data must not include:

• spaces or dividers
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column S — entity’s bank account number

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s bank account number.

The data must be:

• no more than 25 characters in length
• only numerical characters
• in the correct format, for example 12345678912

The data must not include:

• spaces or dividers
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column T — entity’s email address

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s email address.

The data must be no more than 100 characters in length. This field can contain the ‘@’ symbol.

The data must not include:

• spaces or dividers
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Column U — entity’s telephone number

This is a conditional field. You can leave this field blank if you do not have this information.

Enter the entity’s telephone number.

The data must be:

• no more than 20 characters in length
• only numerical characters
• in the correct format, for example 12345678912

The data must not include:

• spaces or dividers
• punctuation marks or typographical symbols
• words such as ‘ditto’, ‘not known’ or ‘see above’

Columns V, W and X

These are conditional fields. You should leave these fields blank unless your data holder notice asks you for this information.