From spreadsheet to digital records for MTD

If you have run your rental finances on a spreadsheet for years, Making Tax Digital can sound like the end of an era. You have your columns arranged, rent in, expenses out, a total at the bottom. So it is fair to ask what actually has to change.

Less than you might fear. Much of what you already do carries straight over. What changes is mostly how the numbers reach HMRC, not the record-keeping habits you have already built.

What MTD asks of you

Making Tax Digital for Income Tax (MTD for Income Tax, sometimes called MTD ITSA) is being phased in based on your qualifying income. That is your gross rental income plus any self-employment income, before expenses.

• Over £50,000: from 6 April 2026
• Over £30,000: from 6 April 2027
• Over £20,000: from 6 April 2028

If you are under £20,000, you are not required to join yet.

Once you are in, three things are expected of you:

1. Keep digital records of your income and expenses.
2. Send HMRC four quarterly updates each tax year.
3. Submit one tax return after the tax year ends.

That is the whole shape of it.

What stays the same

Quite a lot. If you already log rent as it arrives and file your receipts, that instinct is exactly what MTD rewards.

The categories you track do not change. Rent received, letting agent fees, repairs, insurance, mortgage interest, the boiler service: the same income and expense types still apply, so there is nothing new to learn there.

The tax year is still 6 April to 5 April. And your final deadline does not move either. The tax return is your new version of Self Assessment, due by 31 January following the end of the tax year, the same date you have always known. It is where everything is pulled together and confirmed.

You also do not suddenly need an accountant. Plenty of landlords with one property or a small portfolio manage this themselves. The quarterly updates are running totals of income and expenses, figures you already have, not full tax returns.

What changes

There are a few real differences, and it is worth being honest about them.

Your records need to be digital in a connected sense. A spreadsheet is a digital file, but on its own it cannot send anything to HMRC. Your records need to live in software that can talk to HMRC directly, or be linked to it, so the figures flow through without being retyped by hand. That link is the part a standalone spreadsheet cannot do alone.

You will report more often. Instead of one Self Assessment return a year, you send four quarterly updates. The standard quarters end on 5 July, 5 October, 5 January and 5 April, with deadlines of 7 August, 7 November, 7 February and 7 May. A quarterly update is a snapshot of your totals so far, and nothing is finalised at that stage.

The updates are cumulative. From 2025-26 onwards, each one shows your year-to-date totals rather than that quarter in isolation, so your third update covers everything from 6 April up to that point. If a figure was slightly off earlier in the year, the next cumulative total catches up and corrects it, which is rather forgiving.

Why this is easier in the long run

The old rhythm of ignoring things for months and then facing a daunting January disappears. With digital records you update little and often, so by the time the tax return comes round you are confirming figures, not unearthing them from a shoebox. Because the software does the filing, you are not copying numbers into HMRC's systems by hand, which means fewer transcription slips.

Making the switch feel small

When you move across, you do not lose your history. Most of the work is:

• Setting up your property, or properties, in the software.
• Taking the categories from your existing spreadsheet, which map across neatly.
• Carrying on as normal, logging rent and costs as they happen.

Get your records into compatible software before your start date, so the quarterly filing is a click rather than a scramble.

This is the gap Quarterwise is built to close. It keeps your digital records, then files your quarterly updates and tax return to HMRC, so the familiar parts stay familiar and the filing is handled for you.

The spreadsheet served you well. Digital records give it the one thing it was always missing, a direct line to HMRC.

This article is general information, not tax advice. Please check with HMRC or a qualified accountant about your own circumstances.