CH259100 - How to do a compliance check: using inspection powers: cashing up: overview

What is ’cashing up’?

’Cashing up‘ is a term used to describe the process of counting all the individual payments that a business has received from customers, and reconciling this with their sales record. This is usually carried out at the end of the day but a business may do this at intervals during the day as part of their security procedures.

Businesses operating a retail scheme for VAT purposes are required to record their daily gross takings (DGT). The record of DGT must include all payments as they are received.

Further information on DGT can be found in VRS4050 and VAT Notice 727: retail schemes.

When to observe a business cashing up

You may wish to observe a customer’s cashing up procedure for the following reasons:

• To make sure that the customer’s cashing up procedure is robust, and that all retail supplies are included in the record of DGT.
• To see if the record of DGT on the day of your inspection is consistent with previous records of DGT.
• At the end of an invigilation carried out to quantify arrears of tax see CH258000.