Income Tax Self-Assessment Ecosystem Data and Integration - Innovation-Led Proof of Concept

What the buyer is asking for

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) has launched a competitive procurement for the delivery of an innovation-led Proof of Concept (PoC) exploring how emerging technologies, richer transaction data and integrations across banking, payment, fintech and software ecosystems could support increased simplification and accuracy within Income Tax Self Assessment (ITSA). The PoC will build, test and evaluate a working technical demonstrator. Its purpose is to generate evidence and learning, rather than develop a live service or commit HMRC to a specific future solution. This work supports HMRC's Transformation Roadmap and aligns with HMRC's Strategic Approach to Third Party Software. It explores how banking, payments, fintech and software ecosystems can help customers manage their tax affairs through the products and services they already use, reducing administrative effort, improving visibility of tax obligations and helping customers get their tax right first time, while building on a thriving and innovative market. Making Tax Digital (MTD) for Income Tax provides the digital foundations for ITSA and continues to roll out. Innovation across banking, payments, fintech and software markets presents opportunities to develop, test and better understand ecosystem approaches to support more efficient and effective tax administration that makes it simpler for customers to meet their tax responsibilities. For many ITSA customers, software and fintech products already provide valuable automation and support, helping many customers to manage their tax affairs more efficiently. However, richer data, improved standards and greater interoperability may create opportunities to further enhance transaction categorisation and apportionment, reducing customer effort, supporting customer experience and ensuring more accurate tax outcomes. HMRC wants to test and learn with the market how banks, payment providers, fintechs and software platforms can build on existing capabilities to deliver more integrated, accurate and customer-centred tax experiences, while supporting a thriving and innovative software ecosystem. The central question for the PoC is: to what extent can future enhanced data, ecosystem integrations, and interventions reduce customer effort, improve customer experience and improve accuracy across more aspects of Income Tax Self Assessment? HMRC welcomes ideas from suppliers which innovate further, building on today, and looking towards future capabilities. Suppliers are welcome to bid independently or in partnership to build, test and evaluate an end-to-end working technical demonstrator of enhanced future capabilities and integrations. Alongside SMEs, HMRC anticipates that this procurement will be suitable for participation by consortia involving banks, payment providers, fintechs and accounting software providers.

How this is scored

Published by the buyer. A winning response is written to these weightings, not to the question.

• 25%qualitySKILLS AND CAPABILITIES - Delivering for HMRCWith reference to Attachment B - Specification (Stage 1), Attachment C - HMRC Detailed Problem Statement and Attachment D - Preliminary Market Engagement Slides, please demonstrate your skills, expertise, ability and capacity to deliver against HMRC's problem statement. Your response must include: a) An overview of your capabilities as an organisation, b) If bidding in partnership or consortium, an overview of the members within the partnership or consortium and your expected division of responsibilities and capabilities. This question will be scored based on how well the response answers the question and any evaluation criteria included in the question in line with the scoring matrix contained in Table 1 above. Please confirm that you have addressed this question in your response. Your written transcript response and video submission will be evaluated together.
• 75%qualityPROPOSAL - Income Tax Self-Assessment Ecosystem Data and Integration - Innovation-Led Proof of ConceptWith reference to Attachment B - Specification (Stage 1), Attachment C - HMRC Detailed Problem Statement and Attachment D - Preliminary Market Engagement, please set out your proposed solution. Your proposed solution does not need to be fully developed at this initial stage, but your response must make clear that your idea is fundamentally viable and deliverable for HMRC within the available timeframe. Your response should include: 1. Your proposed future-state vision. 2. What enhanced data you would utilise. 3. What integrations would be required. 4. How customer interventions would work. 5. How your approach addresses: mis-categorisation; mis-apportionment; gross vs net ambiguity 6. How your approach could: improve accuracy; reduce customer effort; improve customer experience. 7. Why your concept is technically and operationally credible. The assessment criteria and weighting within this question will be as follows: Understanding of the challenge Understanding of the Income Tax Self-Assessment challenges being explored, including the problem areas: • categorisation, • apportionment, • gross/net identification And the accuracy, customer effort and customer experience challenges they present. Innovation and technical vision How convincingly your proposed future-state approach demonstrates the potential for enhanced data, ecosystem integrations, interventions and confidence-based automation beyond capabilities of today, to improve tax outcomes. Data and ecosystem proposition The credibility and potential value of the proposed ecosystem participants, data sources, integrations and technologies, including transparency regarding any legal, commercial, operational or technical barriers, dependencies and assumptions. Quality of the proposed measurement approach How convincingly you explain what evidence your proposed concept could generate. How you would demonstrate improvements in transaction: • categorisation, • apportionment, • gross/net identification, • confidence-based automation (if used), • customer (or agent) effort, and • customer experience. Suppliers should be transparent about any assumptions, limitations, dependencies or gaps. How you can enable HMRC's independent testing. This question will be scored based on how well the response answers the question and any evaluation criteria included in the question in line with the scoring matrix contained in Table 1 above. Bidders must score at least 50 unweighted points on this question to be eligible to proceed to stage 2. Scoring 50 or higher is no guarantee of being shortlisted for stage 2. Please confirm that you have addressed this question in your response. Your written transcript response and video submission will be evaluated together.

How contested is this?

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Timeline

4 published dates · Europe/London

1. Tender notice publishedyesterday

   28 Sept 2026, 15:30 BST
2. Clarification questions byin 3 days

   2 Oct 2026, 17:00 BST
3. Submission deadlinein 13 days

   12 Oct 2026, 14:00 BST
4. Award decision expected byin 74 days

   11 Dec 2026, 23:59 GMT

Commercial outcome and contract awards

Nothing awarded yet

Notice history

6 events · 6 releases on Find a Tender

1. Pipeline or early engagement notice19 Jun 2026, 15:25 BST058204-2026
2. Pipeline or early engagement notice11 Aug 2026, 13:45 BST076229-2026
3. Notice published20 Aug 2026, 14:20 BST079492-2026
4. Notice published21 Aug 2026, 16:34 BST080083-2026
5. Tender notice28 Sept 2026, 14:01 BST091461-2026
6. Tender updated28 Sept 2026, 15:30 BST091530-2026

Documents

• Tender notice on Find a Tender