A firm that prepares Self Assessment returns, partnership returns or Making Tax Digital quarterly updates usually wants one screen that answers “who is still to do?” for the whole client list. Tax Optimiser has three such screens, one for each kind of return. They are off until the firm turns them on, so a firm that only does company accounts never sees them.
The three lists
- SA100 Returns — every individual client of the firm for a tax year, with the state of their SA100 Self Assessment return and the tax due.
- SA800 Returns — every partnership and LLP client for a tax year, with the state of its SA800 partnership return.
- MTD ITSA — every Making Tax Digital client for a tax year, with their HMRC connection, quarterly update progress and final declaration.
Each list has the same shape: a tax year dropdown, a status filter, a search box, a status badge on every row and a link that opens the client’s return. A client with nothing started for the chosen year still appears, marked Not started, so the list is the firm’s whole client set rather than only the returns someone has already opened.
Turn a list on
- In the firm menu, open Firm Settings and choose Firm.
- Open the Companies House tab and scroll to the switches below Enable Working Papers.
- Tick any of Show SA100 Returns in the Menu, Show SA800 Returns in the Menu and Show MTD ITSA in the Menu.
- Click Save.
The menu changes straight away: the ticked items appear below Working Papers on the next page you open. Untick a switch and the item goes again. Nothing else changes — each client’s return is still reached from the client as before, and the lists only read what is already recorded.
The switches apply to everyone at the firm. A Tax Optimiser administrator or reseller working as the firm sees the same menu. Clients signing in to their own organisation never see these items, which belong to the firm menu only.
How every list works
- Tax year — the list shows one tax year at a time. The SA100 and SA800 lists open on the year now being filed (the latest year that has ended); the MTD ITSA list opens on the year in progress, because that is where quarterly updates are happening. The dropdown offers the current and previous years plus any year the firm has data for.
- Status — narrows the list to one status word, such as Not started or Rejected, so a review queue is one click.
- Search — matches as you type on the client or partnership name and on the reference column (UTR, or National Insurance number on the MTD list).
- Late — a red badge next to the status when the filing deadline has passed and the return is not with HMRC. The Deadline column shows the date it is measured against.
- Summary line — above the table, a sentence such as “12 of 40 clients filed for 2025-26” for the chosen year.
- Action menu — the icon at the end of each row opens the return (or starts one), the client’s record, and on the MTD list the quarterly updates and final declaration screens.
- Paging and sorting — click a column heading to sort; the page size control is under the table.
Who sees which clients
The SA100 and MTD ITSA lists show every individual client of the firm. The SA800 list respects the restriction a firm can put on an accountant: a user limited to named organisations sees only those partnerships, as on Working Papers and the Accounts and Corporation Tax list. Individual clients are not organisation-scoped, so that restriction does not apply to them.
