I'm preparing my tax return (late I know). I work on the accruals basis. Part of my procedure is requesting old MIRAS 5 (certificate of interest) from my mortgagees and popping the amounts in appropriate boxes in my spreadsheet, which then feed into boxes on the return. However recent conversation with Platform (co-op) has made me doubt my understanding of the information on this form. Of course MIRAS is redundant so it's difficult to go anywhere and check. So I'd be grateful if I could check my understanding here:
I understand the form deducts any repayment element of the mortgage, giving an interest only figure - that's fine and obviously useful if you have a repayment mortgage.
I also assumed that the figure on the form was the total interest charged daily between 06/04/xx and 05/04/xx of any tax year, regardless of what you actually paid. So if you have a complete tax year of mortgage payments, the interest charged and the interest paid will be about the same. But if you take out or pay off a mortgage within a tax year, the form will give you the tax due, even if that's not what you actually paid.
I took out my mortgage with Platform on 12/03/20. I pay in arrears and my first actual payment was 01/05/20. I've just rung Platform to request a tax certificate to cover the period from 12/03/20 to 05/04/20 but the person I spoke to said they couldn't do that because I hadn't paid anything. I queried what would be the point of requesting a certificate if I could just add up the payments for the year (it's an interest only mortgage) but he didn't know what I was talking about.
As it happens, I can calculate the figure myself. However, if my understanding of how the certificate works is wrong, it may be that I've uncovered a general error running through my previous returns. I don't think it's a significant enough error to lose sleep over but I am interested so would appreciate any views.
Many thanks.
I understand the form deducts any repayment element of the mortgage, giving an interest only figure - that's fine and obviously useful if you have a repayment mortgage.
I also assumed that the figure on the form was the total interest charged daily between 06/04/xx and 05/04/xx of any tax year, regardless of what you actually paid. So if you have a complete tax year of mortgage payments, the interest charged and the interest paid will be about the same. But if you take out or pay off a mortgage within a tax year, the form will give you the tax due, even if that's not what you actually paid.
I took out my mortgage with Platform on 12/03/20. I pay in arrears and my first actual payment was 01/05/20. I've just rung Platform to request a tax certificate to cover the period from 12/03/20 to 05/04/20 but the person I spoke to said they couldn't do that because I hadn't paid anything. I queried what would be the point of requesting a certificate if I could just add up the payments for the year (it's an interest only mortgage) but he didn't know what I was talking about.
As it happens, I can calculate the figure myself. However, if my understanding of how the certificate works is wrong, it may be that I've uncovered a general error running through my previous returns. I don't think it's a significant enough error to lose sleep over but I am interested so would appreciate any views.
Many thanks.
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