Independent survey
Small Business VAT and MTD Survey 2026: Tell Us How It Really Works for You
Opening soon
- About 8 minutes
- Anonymous
4days to go
Opens on 15 October, in 4 days
Opens 15 OctoberCloses 30 November
We are running an independent survey of UK small businesses, sole traders and landlords about VAT and Making Tax Digital. It takes about 8 minutes, it is anonymous, and we will publish the full results free on this site in January 2027. The aim is simple: put real experience next to the official figures, so that owners, advisers and policymakers can see what the rules actually cost in time, money and decisions.
Key facts
- Who can take part
- Anyone aged 18 or over who owns or helps run a UK business, or is self employed or a landlord
- Time needed
- About 8 minutes. Most questions are tick boxes
- Anonymous
- We do not ask for your name, business name or address
- Open
- 15 October to 30 November 2026
- Results
- Published free in January 2027, with the full method
Why we are running this survey
Two things changed a lot for small businesses in the last couple of years, and the official evidence has not caught up with either.
The first is the VAT registration threshold. It has been £90,000 since April 2024, and HMRC’s own published research into how businesses behave as they approach it is based on interviews carried out in early 2016, when the threshold was a little over £80,000. A lot has happened since, from inflation to the cost of living, and we want to know whether owners are still turning work away to stay under the line.
The second is Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, which became compulsory for sole traders and landlords with qualifying income over £50,000 on 6 April 2026. The first quarterly updates were due on 7 August 2026. This is the first year anyone can describe the system from experience rather than expectation, and we would like to capture that while it is fresh.
We use this site to explain VAT and build free calculators. Hearing directly from the people who use them helps us decide what to write and build next. We are not selling anything through this survey and we will not use your answers for marketing.
What we will ask
- About your business How it is set up, sector, size, region and a turnover band. No names.
- The VAT threshold Whether the £90,000 limit has affected decisions such as taking on work, prices or hours, and what you think of it.
- Doing VAT returns Who prepares them, how long they take, what they cost and which parts cause most difficulty.
- MTD for Income Tax Whether it applies to you, how sign up and quarterly updates went, cost and confidence.
- Tools and help Where you go for VAT information and whether you use AI tools for bookkeeping or tax.
- One change An optional free text box: if you could change one thing about VAT or MTD, what would it be?
You can skip any question you would rather not answer, and you will only see the sections that apply to you. If you are not VAT registered, for example, you will not be asked about VAT returns.
Take the survey
Survey form goes here.
Replace this box with your form embed code before publishing.
What existing research already says
Here is what published research tells us so far. We will compare our results with these figures, while being clear about the differences in method.
Staying under the VAT threshold
of businesses that were not VAT registered but traded within £7,000 of the threshold said they had taken some action to stay below it.
HMRC Research Report 446, telephone survey of 2,009 businesses, fieldwork January to March 2016, published November 2017.
Among those who had held their turnover down, the actions they described were:
Closed the business or stopped advertising47%
Turned down work21%
Asked customers to buy materials16%
Cut prices10%
Split the business10%
Source: HMRC Research Report 446.
The tax data points the same way. The Office of Tax Simplification found a sharp drop in the number of sole traders just above the threshold in 2014 to 2015: around 7,100 had turnover between £80,000 and £81,000, against roughly 3,900 in the next £1,000 band. It called the threshold a cliff edge. Academic work using HMRC data has found that firms’ turnover growth slows by about one percentage point a year as they get close to the threshold.
£80,000 to £81,000around 7,100
Next £1,000 bandroughly 3,900
Source: Office of Tax Simplification.
Today the threshold is £90,000 to register and £88,000 to deregister. In HMRC’s 2024 to 2025 statistics, 38% of VAT registered traders declared turnover at or below £90,000, which shows how many businesses register voluntarily. You can track your own position with our VAT threshold calculator.
Making Tax Digital for VAT
HMRC’s final evaluation of MTD for VAT, published in February 2025, drew on several large surveys of businesses:
- 41%Among smaller businesses that joined from 2022, 41% said the benefits outweighed the costs and 23% said the costs outweighed the benefits.
- 45%45% said their software saved them time.
- 26 to 40 hoursHMRC estimates that businesses with fully functional software save 26 to 40 hours a year.
- £185m to £195mAn earlier HMRC evaluation estimated that MTD for VAT brought in £185 million to £195 million of extra tax in 2019 to 2020 by cutting errors.
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax
| From | Applies if qualifying income is over |
|---|---|
| 6 April 2026 | £50,000 |
| 6 April 2027 | £30,000 |
| 6 April 2028 | £20,000 |
- In February 2026 HMRC said 864,000 sole traders and landlords were in scope for April 2026.
- By August 2026, more than 570,000 had signed up and 436,000 had sent their first quarterly update.
- HMRC has said it will not give penalty points for late quarterly updates in the 2026 to 2027 tax year.
- Since September 2026, HMRC has been signing up people over the £50,000 limit who had not joined themselves, in stages.
- In October 2026 HMRC estimated that around 1,077,000 more sole traders and landlords will need to join when the limit drops to £30,000 in April 2027.
- In HMRC’s research with tax agents in July 2025, 51% expected all their clients to comply, up from 37% in December 2024.
- 2026 figures
- HMRC estimate for April 2027
In scope for April 2026864,000
Signed up by August 2026more than 570,000
Sent first quarterly update by August 2026436,000
More expected to join in April 2027around 1,077,000
Source: HMRC.
Read our Making Tax Digital guide for what you need to do.
Tax admin as a burden
In the government’s Longitudinal Small Business Survey 2024, 61% of small businesses with employees named taxation, including VAT, as a major obstacle, up 16 points on 2023. Among businesses with no employees, the figure was 29%.
Small businesses with employees61%
Businesses with no employees29%
In HMRC’s Administrative Burdens Advisory Board survey in April 2026, which had 10,195 responses, about 60% said they saw no benefits from MTD for Income Tax, and 61.6% said tax admin burdens had got worse over the past year. Like ours, that survey relies on people choosing to respond.
AI and bookkeeping
The Office for National Statistics found in June 2026 that 28% of businesses with fewer than 10 employees used at least one AI technology, against about 35% of businesses with 10 or more. We will ask specifically about AI for bookkeeping, tax and VAT, which official surveys do not separate out.
Fewer than 10 employees28%
10 or more employeesabout 35%
Source: Office for National Statistics.
How the survey works
We want the results to be useful, so we are setting out the method now rather than after the event.
- An open online survey. Anyone who meets the criteria can take part, through links on this site, our newsletter, social media and business groups, and accountants who pass it on.
- Not a random sample. People choose whether to respond, so the results describe the businesses that answered, not every UK business. We will say this clearly and will not quote a margin of error, because one would not be meaningful here.
- Neutral questions. Answer options are balanced and include “not sure” and “prefer not to say”. The threshold questions follow the topics HMRC asked about in 2016, so the two can be compared with care.
- Showing our numbers. Every chart will show how many people answered that question. We will not report a result for any group with fewer than 50 responses.
- Cleaning the data. We will remove responses from people who do not meet the criteria, obvious duplicates and answers that are clearly not genuine, and say how many were removed.
- Every year. We plan to repeat the core questions each autumn so changes can be tracked over time.
Timeline
| Stage | When |
|---|---|
| Survey opens | 15 October 2026 |
| Survey closes | 30 November 2026 |
| Results published | January 2027 |
| Next survey | Autumn 2027 |
Your privacy
- No names. We do not ask for your name, business name, address or any information about health, ethnicity or other sensitive subjects. Please do not include personal details in the free text answer.
- Your choice. Taking part is voluntary. You can skip questions and stop at any point, and nothing is saved unless you press submit.
- Results by email, if you want them. At the end you can leave an email address to get the results. It is collected separately and cannot be linked to your answers. We will use it only to send the results and will delete it once they are sent. You can ask us to delete it sooner by writing to [your contact email].
- Who sees the answers. Only the people running the survey see the raw responses. We publish only totals and percentages, plus a few short free text comments with any identifying details removed.
- How long we keep them. We will delete the raw responses 12 months after the results are published.
- No marketing. We will not use your answers to market anything to you. See our privacy policy for more, including your rights under UK data protection law.
Ready to take part?
It takes about 8 minutes, it is anonymous, and the full results will be free on this site in January 2027.
Frequently asked questions
I am not VAT registered. Should I still take part?
Yes, please. Businesses below the threshold are exactly the people who can tell us whether the £90,000 limit is affecting decisions. You will skip the questions about VAT returns.
I am a landlord with no other business. Can I take part?
Yes. Landlords are covered by Making Tax Digital for Income Tax, and that section of the survey applies to you.
Can my accountant fill it in for me?
We would rather hear from you, because we ask about your own experience. Accountants and bookkeepers can help most by sharing the link with clients.
Is this linked to HMRC?
No. This is an independent survey run by this site. HMRC does not see individual answers. We will share the published results with anyone who finds them useful, including HMRC and representative bodies.
Will the results represent all UK small businesses?
No, and we will not claim they do. Because people choose to respond, the results show what this group of businesses told us. They are most useful alongside the official research above, not as a replacement for it.
When will the results be out?
We aim to publish them in January 2027. If you leave your email at the end of the survey, we will send you a link.