Your CIS refund, filed for a flat fee.£249 flat. You see the refund figure before you pay.

Your contractor takes 20% off every payment (30% if you never registered) before you see it. That deduction ignores your £12,570 tax-free allowance and all your expenses, so for most subcontractors it is more than the tax actually due for the year. The difference comes back once a tax return is filed.

From 6 April, as soon as you have the year's statements. The earlier the return goes in, the earlier HMRC pays. The legal deadline for the 2025/26 return is 31 January 2027, but waiting for the deadline means waiting for your money.

HMRC sets the timing. Guides published in 2026 quote anything from two to twelve weeks, and gov.uk says within eight weeks for company claims. We record our own filed-to-paid days and publish them monthly on the how-long page. There is no faster-refund add-on here because nobody can make HMRC faster.

Straight from HMRC to your own bank account. We never take an assignment of your refund. Since 15 March 2023 the law treats an assignment of an income tax repayment as void, so an agent asking you to sign one is asking for something HMRC will not honour.

Your UTR, the CIS deduction statements your contractor must give you each month (photos are fine), and your expenses: van, fuel, tools, protective kit, phone, insurance. If a statement is missing, HMRC's own record of your deductions fills the gap; we ask your contractor only with your say-so.

Nothing goes on your return without a statement, receipt, bank line, mileage log or HMRC's own flat rate behind it, so if HMRC asks, we can show them. That can make a refund smaller than one built on round-number expenses. We answer HMRC's questions on returns we filed at no charge.

Yes. HMRC's Self Assessment service is free, and if your year is simple you can file it yourself. People pay us because they want the expenses done properly, the return signed by a chartered accountant, and someone to chase HMRC.

If what you were paid before deductions in 2025/26, plus any rent, was over £30,000, HMRC requires quarterly digital updates from 6 April 2027. That is most full-time trades. HMRC writes to you after it has looked at your 2025/26 return. The Budget on 28 October 2026 confirmed that nobody joining in April 2027 gets penalty points for late quarterly updates in the first year; a late year-end return still counts. The checker on this page tells you where you stand from one figure.

Year one: we sign you up to Making Tax Digital and become your agent, file your 2026/27 return once your March statement is in (contractors have until 19 April 2027 to issue it), HMRC pays the refund to your own account, and we send your four quarterly updates for 2027/28 through a bookkeeping app we set up for you. The 2027/28 year-end return is next April's job and next year's fee. The quarterly updates are running totals of income and expenses; no tax is worked out or refunded on them, so the refund still comes once a year.

Nothing at sign-up: no card, no mandate. When your return is ready we send you the draft with the refund figure and the lines that earned it. You check it, approve it and pay £349 on the same page (Apple Pay, Google Pay or a card). We file the moment the payment clears and HMRC's receipt lands in your WhatsApp. If the return shows no refund is due, the fee is £149. We never receive the refund; HMRC pays it to your own account. Nothing renews unless you say so.

Then CIS Year becomes the ordinary refund service at £249, paid when you approve the return, and the difference is never charged. The checker on this page is an estimate from the figure you type; HMRC's letter and your filed 2025/26 return decide.