How to enter management expenses in the CT600 filing wizard

Before you start

Prepare the expense classification, current amount, eligible carry-forward from the previous computation and any chosen partial claims. You do not need to upload evidence for these inputs. Read what qualifies and how boxes 245 and 850 work if you need the general rules. Capital acquisition costs and costs already relieved elsewhere do not belong in this deduction.

1. Enter your figures

1. On Financial data, enter the expense in its accounts cost row. For a property company this can be Other charges within the property expense rows. Keep qualifying charitable donations in their own row.
2. Open Tax adjustments. Enter Investment management expenses beside the green 245 badge. Its help tooltip explains that this identifies qualifying expenses already included in the costs above.
3. If both property and trading costs contain expenses, answer How much of it is included in the property costs above. Enter 0 when all management expenses sit in trading costs. Leaving this answer blank is different from entering 0.
4. If an older draft uses Income from property (net) and the current management expense has a property part, select Enter gross rent and separate expenses. Enter the rent and property costs in the newly shown rows. The retained Your property tax base (optional override) must be your prepared property result before the separate management expense deduction. Edit it or remove it to use the calculated base.
5. Enter Excess management expenses brought forward. For periods starting on or after 1 April 2017, leave Excess management expenses to claim this period blank to claim the maximum, enter 0 for no claim or enter a partial claim. A brought-forward-only claim works with legacy net property entry and needs no conversion. An opening pool in an accounting period crossing 1 April 2017 needs a separate historical transitional calculation that this filing route does not provide.
6. Check the calculated Opening, Maximum and Closing figures beneath each claim. If Company deductions allowance appears in a separate row, enter any applicable allowance allocated to this company. For two returns, each allowance row names its return. The same allowance may instead appear with other carried-forward claims. It is shared, not an additional allowance for each pool.
7. With qualifying donations and no management amounts, choose Treat unused donations as management expenses of an investment business, carried forward? Choose the treatment applicable to donations made for investment-business purposes. Entering a management amount applies investment-business treatment while retaining your saved answer. Removing that amount restores the answer for you to edit.

Current qualifying management expense

Investment management expenses

Already included in the accounts costs. Do not also add it back under Property disallowable expenses.

Property part when both expense streams exist

How much of it is included in the property costs above

A subset of the current amount, including an explicit 0 when applicable.

Eligible opening pool

Excess management expenses brought forward

Use the previous computation closing balance, excluding amounts used or surrendered. It can include eligible unused donations.

Chosen brought-forward relief

Excess management expenses to claim this period

Blank uses the maximum, 0 claims none and a positive amount is a partial claim. Earlier pre-April 2017 periods use a mandatory deduction, so leave the claim blank.

2. Complete both returns for a long accounting period

Under Investment management expenses, open Divide management expenses between your two tax returns. Review the displayed dates, enter your prepared division and confirm both amounts. The suggestion uses days in each return. You can change it. The two Investment management expenses amounts divide the same total entered above. They must add up to that total and do not add another accounts expense.

The accounts expense reversal continues to follow the accounts split even if you assign the whole deduction to one return. Complete Excess management expenses to claim this period (Return 1) and (Return 2) independently. Return 2 can receive an opening pool created by return 1 even when the filing began with no brought-forward balance. Date or amount edits may require you to reconfirm the allocation.

3. Fictional entry example

A company has £18,000 rent and £7,000 property costs, including £2,500 qualifying management expenses. Enter those accounts figures, then £2,500 in the management expense field. With no other adjustments or opening pool, the calculation shows £13,500 property profit, £2,500 in box 245 and £11,000 taxable total profits. The accounts retain £7,000 costs. Box 850 is blank because all current management expenses were relieved.

4. Check the result before submitting

Review the tax preview, CT600 and tax computation. The property calculation should reverse only the management expense included in property costs. A company with no trade should have no artificial trading profit or trading loss. A manual property tax base remains the amount you entered.

Box 245 is the management deduction used. Box 850 contains only unrelieved current management expenses, excluding the opening pool and donations. The reconciliation shows the accounts reversal, current deduction, brought-forward claim, eligible unused donations and closing pool. For two returns, check each allocation, claim and box 850 separately. The final closing pool is return 2's balance.

Save your draft and resume it if needed. Check your restored figures before authorising the return and selecting Submit. The platform submits the filing you review.

Official sources

• CTA 2009 section 1219: current management expenses.
• CTA 2009 section 1223: opening pools, donations and claims.
• HMRC CTM08620: carry-forward conditions and claim deadline.
• CTA 2010 section 269ZD: carried-forward loss restriction.
• HMRC CT600 guide.