When you're self-employed and operating as a sole trader, you have quite a long time to pay your tax bill after the end of the tax year.
The bill for the tax year that ended on the 5th April 2021 is due 31st January 2022.
That means the tax owed on the work you got paid for in April 2020 isn’t due until a full 20 months later. This can make it really hard to save the right amount for your tax bill throughout the year.
HMRC have an imperfect solution to this problem, which is called payments on account.
You’ll only get asked to start making payments on account after you’ve submitted there first tax return where your tax bill is over £1,000.