How long you need to keep tax records in the UK depends on who you are. Non-business individuals must keep records for at least 22 months after the end of the tax year the return covers. Self-employed people and business partnerships must keep them for five years after the 31 January filing deadline. Limited companies must keep accounting records for six years from the end of the company financial year. Several situations stretch those windows considerably, so the standard period is a floor rather than a safe destruction date.
Non-Business Individuals: 22 Months
If your income comes from employment, pensions, savings, or investments and you do not run a business, you only need to keep records for 22 months after the end of the tax year the return covers.1GOV.UK. Keeping Your Pay and Tax Records – How Long to Keep Your Records For the 2024/25 tax year, which ended on 5 April 2025, that means keeping records until at least 31 January 2027.
The statutory basis is the Taxes Management Act 1970. For non-business individuals, the retention deadline is the first anniversary of 31 January following the tax year, rather than the fifth anniversary that applies to the self-employed.2Legislation.gov.uk. Taxes Management Act 1970, Section 12B This is one of the least-known rules in UK personal tax. Many employees hold onto paperwork for years longer than required because they assume the five-year business rule applies to everyone.
The 22-month window only applies if you filed on time and no inquiry has been opened. If either condition changes, the retention period extends.
Self-Employed and Business Partnerships: Five Years
If you are self-employed or in a business partnership, you must keep records for at least five years after the 31 January submission deadline of the relevant tax year.3GOV.UK. Business Records if You’re Self-Employed – How Long to Keep Your Records In practice, the total time from the end of the tax year to the expiry of this window is roughly five years and ten months.
The maths for a 2024/25 return looks like this. The tax year ends on 5 April 2025. The filing deadline is 31 January 2026. Five years after that takes you to 31 January 2031. That is the earliest date you could safely destroy those records, assuming no inquiry has been opened and you filed on time.
HMRC’s own guidance states that records must be kept longer if a return is filed late.4HM Revenue & Customs. A General Guide to Keeping Records for Your Tax Return If you missed the deadline, hold onto the records until you are certain the inquiry window for that return has closed.
Limited Companies: Six Years
Limited companies must keep accounting records for six years from the end of the company financial year they relate to. This requirement comes from the Companies Act 2006 and sits on top of the tax record rules.5Legislation.gov.uk. Companies Act 2006, Section 388 If a company’s financial year ends on 31 March 2025, those records must be kept until at least 31 March 2031.
Some company records sit outside the six-year accounting rule entirely. Board meeting minutes, shareholder resolutions, and share allotment documentation should generally be retained for the life of the company. Directors carry personal liability for compliance failures, so erring on the side of keeping company records longer is common practice.
Payroll and PAYE: Three Years
Employers must keep payroll and PAYE records for three years from the end of the tax year they relate to. These records cover details of pay and deductions, reports submitted to HMRC, tax code notices, taxable expenses or benefits, and employee leave and sickness absences. Failing to produce them when asked can result in HMRC estimating your liability and charging a penalty of up to £3,000.6GOV.UK. PAYE and Payroll for Employers – Keeping Records
Construction Industry Scheme: Three Years
Contractors operating under the Construction Industry Scheme must keep CIS records for at least three years after the end of the tax year they relate to. The records must cover the gross amount of each subcontractor payment, any deductions made, and material costs invoiced. The penalty for not producing CIS records when HMRC asks is also up to £3,000.7GOV.UK. What You Must Do as a CIS Contractor – Record Keeping
VAT Records: Six Years
VAT-registered businesses must retain all VAT documentation for six years. The starting point of that six-year clock varies by document type. Individual documents like invoices run from their date of issue, summary documents like a balance sheet or trading account run from the date they were prepared, and ledgers and daybooks run from the date of the last entry.8HM Revenue & Customs. Compliance Handbook CH15200 – Record Keeping: VAT: Determining the 6-Year Period
Under Making Tax Digital for VAT, all VAT-registered businesses must keep these records digitally and file their returns using compatible software. The digital link between source data and the submitted VAT return must be maintained and auditable for the full six-year period.9HM Revenue & Customs. VAT Notice 700/22 – Making Tax Digital for VAT
Capital Gains Records: Clock Starts at Sale
Capital gains records are the ones most likely to catch people out, because the retention clock does not start ticking until you sell the asset. If you bought a rental property in 2005 and sell it in 2030, you need the original purchase receipt, records of any improvement works, and incidental expenses from 2005 all the way through to the end of the normal retention window following the tax year of disposal.10HM Revenue & Customs. Compliance Handbook CH14650 – How Long Must Records Be Retained For: Capital Gains or Losses
HMRC’s guidance is explicit: records relating to the acquisition and improvement of a chargeable capital asset must be kept for the appropriate retention period following the period in which the asset is disposed of. For a self-employed person, that means five years after the 31 January deadline for the tax year of the sale. For a non-business individual selling personal shares or a second home, the shorter 22-month window applies from the tax year of disposal, though many advisers recommend keeping capital asset records for longer given the amounts at stake.
This applies to property, shares, valuable personal items, and any other asset subject to capital gains tax. A property purchase receipt could realistically need to be held for decades before it becomes relevant.
Inheritance Tax: Keep Gift Records for Seven Years
Gifts made during your lifetime can become subject to inheritance tax if you die within seven years of making them. The person managing your estate will need to identify every gift made in that seven-year window, so you should keep records of what you gave, who received it, its value, and the date of the gift.11GOV.UK. Inheritance Tax – Rules on Giving Gifts
There is no formal retention period in the same way as income tax records, because the seven-year window is always rolling. As a practical matter, maintain gifting records indefinitely during your lifetime, or at least until seven full years have passed since each gift.
When the Standard Period Gets Extended
Several situations push the retention period well beyond the standard timelines.
Late Filing
Filing a tax return after the deadline extends how long you must keep records. For non-business individuals who file late, records must be kept for at least 15 months after the date the return was actually submitted, rather than the normal 22 months from the end of the tax year.1GOV.UK. Keeping Your Pay and Tax Records – How Long to Keep Your Records
Open Inquiries
If HMRC opens a formal inquiry into your return, you must keep all relevant records until the inquiry is officially closed and any appeal period has expired.2Legislation.gov.uk. Taxes Management Act 1970, Section 12B Inquiries can take months or years to resolve, especially where complex transactions are involved. Destroying records while an inquiry is ongoing is one of the worst mistakes a taxpayer can make.
Discovery Assessments
Even after the normal inquiry window closes, HMRC can issue a discovery assessment if it believes tax has been underpaid. The time limits vary based on the taxpayer’s behaviour:
- 4 years: the normal time limit after the end of the relevant tax period.
- 6 years: where the loss of tax was caused by carelessness on the part of the taxpayer or their representative.
- 12 years: for income tax, capital gains tax, and inheritance tax involving offshore matters or offshore transfers.
- 20 years: where the loss of tax was brought about deliberately, or the taxpayer failed to notify HMRC of their liability to tax.
If your tax affairs involve offshore income, the 12-year window is a relatively recent addition and is easily overlooked. The 20-year window for deliberate underpayment means that anyone who has been less than honest with HMRC should keep records essentially indefinitely. In practice, the discovery assessment timelines are the real ceiling on record retention, not the standard periods.
What Happens If You Don’t Keep Records
HMRC can charge a penalty of up to £3,000 for each failure to keep or preserve adequate records in relation to a tax return.13HM Revenue & Customs. Enquiry Manual EM4650 – Penalties: Failure to Keep or Preserve Records Each failure means one penalty per return, so three missing years could mean three separate penalties. The penalty is discretionary and can be set below the maximum, but the maximum is a hard ceiling.
The practical consequence is often worse than the fine. When you cannot produce records to back up the figures on your return, HMRC can estimate your tax liability based on the information available to it. Those estimates tend not to be generous. The burden of proof sits squarely with the taxpayer, and without records there is no way to challenge HMRC’s figures effectively.
Storing and Destroying Records Safely
HMRC accepts digital copies of records, provided they are legible and accurately reflect the original documents. For most people, scanning paper records and storing them with a reliable backup system is the most practical approach. Digital files should be encrypted and password-protected, with backups stored separately from the originals.
Physical records need a dry, secure location where they are protected from damage and unauthorised access. Once the retention period has expired and no inquiry is open, you can destroy them. Paper records should be shredded with a cross-cut shredder or sent to a professional confidential waste service. Digital files should be securely deleted using methods that overwrite the data rather than simply moving files to the recycle bin.
Before destroying anything, check whether you hold capital assets whose eventual sale would require those records. A box of receipts from a home renovation might look like clutter, but if you sell that property, those records become the foundation of your capital gains calculation.