Standard or calendar quarters

HMRC offers two ways to split a tax year into the four periods a Making Tax Digital business reports against:

• Standard (6 April to 5 July, 6 July to 5 October, 6 October to 5 January, 6 January to 5 April) matches the tax year itself and is the default.
• Calendar (1 April to 30 June, 1 July to 30 September, 1 October to 31 December, 1 January to 31 March) lines up with calendar months, which some bookkeeping habits find easier.

Both have the same four deadlines: 7 August, 7 November, 7 February and 7 May, a month and two days after each quarter ends.

On the Making Tax Digital page, each connected business shows its quarter type with a choice between the two. Pick one before you send that business's first update for the tax year; once an update has been accepted for a business's year, the quarter type for that year is locked, since changing it partway through would mean the cumulative figures no longer line up with HMRC's own obligation periods. You're free to choose again for the next tax year.

If you don't choose, HMRC assumes standard quarters; BusyBee Hub flags this as a warning on your first update of the year so you can decide before it matters.