CT600 Tax Return Filing in Goring-on-Thames: Prepare and File Your Company Tax Return with HMRC

A CT600 is the form HMRC uses for a Company Tax Return. It reports a company's Corporation Tax position for an accounting period, including the company's income, chargeable gains, deductible amounts, reliefs claimed and the resulting Corporation Tax calculation. The return is normally submitted online and is usually accompanied by a copy of the company's accounts and a Corporation Tax computation. Whether a particular company needs to file one depends on its circumstances and on whether HMRC has issued a notice requiring a Company Tax Return for the period.

Yes — they are two separate filing obligations, sent to two different organisations for different purposes. Statutory accounts are prepared under an accounting framework and filed with Companies House, where they become part of the public record. A CT600 is a Company Tax Return submitted to HMRC to report the company's Corporation Tax position. The accounts figures often feed into the tax work, but filing accounts with Companies House does not satisfy the CT600 obligation, and filing a CT600 does not replace the Companies House filing.

It can, yes. There is no separate micro-entity version of the CT600 — a micro-entity company uses the same Company Tax Return as any other company, and where HMRC requires a return for an accounting period, the company needs to submit one. Being small or preparing simplified accounts does not by itself remove the filing requirement. Equally, that does not mean every micro-entity owes Corporation Tax: whether any tax is payable depends on the company's own circumstances and its taxable position, and filing the return is a separate obligation from paying any tax that turns out to be due.

The Corporation Tax computation is the working that takes your accounting profit and adjusts it to arrive at taxable profit, showing how items such as disallowable expenses, capital allowances, losses and timing differences are treated. The CT600 is the actual Company Tax Return form that reports those results to HMRC. In practice the two are filed together, because the CT600 boxes draw on the figures produced by the computation — but they serve different purposes, and a reliable computation is what makes the return boxes defensible.

Taxable profit starts from the profit shown in the accounts and is then adjusted. Typical adjustments include adding back expenditure that is not allowable for tax purposes, replacing depreciation with capital allowances where they are available, dealing with income or expenditure that falls into a different period for tax, and using brought-forward losses where the rules allow. The result is the taxable profit on which any Corporation Tax liability is worked out. Because the adjustments depend on the company's specific transactions, the computation is prepared case by case rather than from a fixed formula.

No. Filing the return and paying any Corporation Tax due are separate obligations, with separate requirements and their own timetables. Submitting a CT600 tells HMRC what the company's position is for the period; it does not, by itself, settle the tax. If a liability arises, payment needs to be arranged separately. This is one reason it helps to know the likely tax position before the filing is finalised, so that cash flow can be planned rather than discovered at the last moment.

Yes. A company can appoint an agent to prepare and submit its Company Tax Return, and the agent is authorised to deal with HMRC on the company's behalf. The company remains responsible for the accuracy of what is filed and for making any payment that is due, but the day-to-day work — assembling the records, preparing the accounts, building the tax computation and submitting the return online — can be handled for you. That is often the appeal for directors who would rather spend their time running the business.

As a starting point, you will need the company's accounting records for the period — a trial balance or draft accounts, the accounting period dates, and details of income and expenditure. It also helps to have information on fixed asset additions and disposals, any loans or related-party transactions, interest received or paid, brought-forward losses, and anything unusual that may need a tax adjustment. If the company has previously filed returns, earlier computations and returns are useful for consistency. The more complete the records, the smoother the CT600 Tax Return Filing process tends to be, and any gaps are usually best identified early rather than at the filing stage.