Early Retiree and Self Assessment

Whether you need to complete a tax return every year depends on your circumstances, and what income streams you have. If you're just a basic rate tax payer and merely receive a company pension and have savings that are taxed at source, like in a bank or building society, and don't have any complicated investments that give rise to capital gains over the CGT allowance, there is no need for you to fill in a return every year. In the first year, they might want one, because it may well be a complicated year with severance payments etc, but there should be no continuing need. If you keep getting requests, phone them and tell them your circumstances, and they'll probably stop sending them.

If you register for self-assessment online, that might tell you if a return is outstanding for the current year. I've already done mine for this year so can't check, but I think I've seen it flagged as such in previous years.

And if you think you need to send them one, you can do it anyway regardless of whether they've asked for one.

They keep sending me letters saying I don't need to do tax returns any more, which is stupid as I pay HRT and have a variable amount of savings, gift aid and pension contributions, so there is always a discrepancy between what I've paid and what I should have paid (and usually they owe me). So they get one off me every year like it or not.

He is not getting one full stop. People seem to think that it is up to HMRC to demand them rather than them inform HMRC that they need to return a SA return.