old paper work

[Gemma1984]

Please help i am moving out soon and so im having a bit of a sort out lately, my question is how long should i keep things like..

credit card,store card and bank statements

pay slips and similar?

[kempie]

By law everyone needs to keep records of their income, gains and expenditures so that they can complete a tax return if they get one.

For your personal tax affairs, you need to keep records at least until the position for a tax year is closed. In most cases this is deemed as 22 months after the end of the financial year.

The records to keep include those needed for income on your annual tax return, capital gains, and perhaps inheritance tax:

� bank statements
� building society record books
� cheque book and paying-in book counterfoils
� forms P60, P11D and P45 from your employment
� contract notes for the sale and purchase of assets such as shares, antiques
� documents recording loans made and received
� documents recording cash gifts made and received
� betting win records

[zmudge]

If you pay tax then the law is that everything must be kept for six years from the end of the tax year to which it relates, and there is a very nasty penalty for not so doing.

[kempie]

Six years is for businesses.

[mfewell]

I keep credit card statements just one back. I don't get printed bank statements anymore (internet - make sure you assiduously keep your pc virus- and spyware-free. Then you can SHRED (not tear up and bin) the lot and be rid of a load of paper.

[zmudge]

Six years now applies to each tax paying individual.

[kempie]

I beg to differ... http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/pdfs/sabk4.htm

[zmudge]

That note is out of date. The current requirement is that individual tax payers retain their records for six years from the end of the tax year to which the records relate.

[kempie]

You would expect the information on HM Revenue & Customs official website to be accurate, don't you think?

Especially as the page bears the new name following the recent(ish) amalgamation of the Inland Revenue and HM Customs & Excise.

[zmudge]

They combined in April of this year. Whether it is a reasonable expectation or not I do not know, but hope springs eternal.

[kempie]

The only reference to a change in the guidelines SABK8 of June 2004 is Tax Bulletin 76 of April 2005 which makes no mention of record keeping.

What is your source for another set of guidelines?