How to start a new payroll tax year

This article explains how to start a new payroll tax year and transfer employee profiles in FreeAgent.

Please note that FreeAgent's payroll functionality won't be available if you have an unincorporated landlord account or if you're preparing your accounts using the cash accounting basis.

Between 6th April 2022 and 5th April 2023, FreeAgent will automatically calculate the increased National Insurance contribution as per HMRC guidelines (3.9.8 National Insurance contributions - Health and Social Care Levy). A message will appear on payslips where applicable, confirming the “1.25% uplift in NICs funds NHS, health & social care” as per HMRC requirements to explain what these funds will be used for.

This will impact payslips raised within the 2022/23 tax year and where the employee is due to pay National Insurance. However, you can edit their payroll profile to remove this message from all of their payslips or edit each individual payslip.

Once you’ve filed (or marked as filed) the month 12 payroll for the existing tax year, you don't need to do anything else. FreeAgent lets HMRC know that you are finished with the previous year, then from 15th Mar you’ll be able to set up a new payroll tax year by following these steps:

1. Navigate to 'Payroll'

Navigate to the 'My Money' tab at the top of the screen and select 'Payroll' from the drop-down menu.

2. Change to the new tax year

By default, FreeAgent displays the year that just ended. Change this by selecting the drop-down and choosing the new tax year.

3. Start the new Payroll year

Select ‘Start new Payroll year’ in the top-right corner. FreeAgent will then use information from last year to create this year’s payroll profiles.

If you need to edit a profile, you can do that before selecting ‘Start new Payroll year’ but you can also edit profiles after the transfer is complete. You can edit an employee’s profile by selecting ‘Edit’ at the far right-hand side of their name. 

Here you can edit the employee’s NI category letter, tax code and any other relevant information. 

To complete the changes to a payroll profile before starting a new payroll year, select 'Create Payroll Profile' at the bottom of the page. To complete the changes to a payroll profile after starting a new payroll year, select 'Update Payroll Profile' at the bottom of the page.