Every date a practice owner or a locum vet has to hold in their head — RCVS renewals, premises registration, the medicines audit, corporation tax, VAT, payroll, self assessment and quarterly updates — on one page you can print and pin up.
Rates and thresholds are 2026/27 unless another date is given, and every figure traces to a primary source. Two things to note before you use it. Business rates figures are England only. And the CMA's remedies are not on here as calendar dates, because no calendar dates exist yet — they are set out further down as periods running from the day the Order is made.
These are the dates that decide whether you and your team are on the register and whether your premises are lawfully holding medicines. Missing them is not a fine — it is a removal.
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| On or before 30 April 2026 | Veterinary surgeon annual renewal for 2026–27: £431. Paid between 1 and 31 May it becomes £468, a £37 late fee. Unpaid by 31 May and you are removed from the Register. The non-UK-practising rate is £214 and the non-practising rate £71 |
| 1 November to 31 October | The registered veterinary nurse renewal cycle. The RVN annual renewal fee was £85 for the year from 1 November 2025 |
| 1 April, every year | Premises registration renewal — £38 per premises on the Register of Veterinary Practice Premises, which the RCVS holds on behalf of the VMD. The fee is exempt from VAT. It is charged per premises: one main site and two branches is three registrations and three fees. The £38 figure is the England and Wales fee |
| Whenever a location changes | Re-check what needs registering. The triggers include buildings where vets provide services, premises advertised as part of a veterinary practice, facilities open to the public for animal treatment, closed buildings serving multiple clients, and any location receiving wholesale deliveries of medicines |
| Every four years, if you are in it | Practice Standards Scheme assessment. PSS is a voluntary accreditation, not a requirement. Accredited practices are assessed every four years and may then enter the PSS Awards. Its medicines module meets VMD requirements, which is why an accredited premises is exempt from a separate VMD inspection. PSS fees carry 20% VAT |
This is the compliance work most likely to be running on habit rather than on a diary entry. The obligations sit in the Veterinary Medicines Regulations 2013, as amended, in force in Great Britain. Northern Ireland follows EU Regulation 2019/6 instead.
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| At least once a year | The audit. Anyone involved in the retail or wholesale supply of POM-V and POM-VPS veterinary medicines must carry out an audit at least once a year. Put a date on it rather than treating it as something that happens when there is time |
| Five years, from the transaction | Retain the receipt and supply documents for POM-V and POM-VPS products, recording the date, the name of the medicine, the batch number, the quantity, the name and address of the supplier or recipient, the name and address of the prescriber, and a copy of the prescription where one was written |
| Five years, from the decision | Where a POM-V or POM-VPS is prescribed without a written prescription, the prescriber must record the reason for prescribing and keep it. A vet prescribing an antibiotic must record the details of fulfilling the conditions and keep that record at least five years too |
| Five years, keeper-side | Food-producing animals. The vet either enters the required information in the keeper's records personally or gives it to the keeper in writing, and the keeper's records are kept at least five years |
| Up to six months from signing | Written prescription validity as standard, or up to 28 days for a controlled drug, unless the prescriber specifies a shorter period. In Northern Ireland a prescription for an antimicrobial or antibiotic is valid for five days only |
The under care requirement changed on 1 September 2023, and it changed in RCVS guidance rather than in legislation — the Regulations have never defined the phrase, and VMD guidance expressly refers to the RCVS interpretation. A physical examination is no longer required to take an animal under care, but it is still required for a suspected notifiable disease, for antimicrobials in non-agricultural animals and for controlled drugs on first prescription, in each case except in exceptional circumstances. A vet with an animal under their care must be able, on a 24/7 basis, to physically examine it — themselves or through another provider under written agreement.
The final report was published on 24 March 2026 and the CMA has six months from that point to make its Order, so the Order must be made by 23 September 2026. That is the CMA's own drafting deadline. The obligations run from the day the Order is made, and not one compliance date in the draft Order is fixed — the text reads, literally, “9 months [X June 2027]”. A Small Veterinary Business has fewer than 15 first opinion practices or out-of-hours centres.
| Obligation | Large | Small |
|---|---|---|
| Out-of-hours contract notice periods and termination fees (Art 19) | Day the Order is made | Day the Order is made |
| Practice information, standard price list, parasiticide list, pet care plans (Arts 6–9) | 3 months | 6 months |
| Policies ensuring vets and nurses can act per the RCVS Codes (Art 13) | 3 months | 6 months |
| Cremation options and prices, including a basic communal option (Art 20) | 3 months | 6 months |
| Ownership information on signage, premises, websites and communications (Art 5) | 6 months | 6 months |
| Complaints process, complaint logs and mediation (Arts 21–23) | 6 months | 6 months |
| Prescription fee caps (Art 18) | 6 months | 12 months |
| Written estimates at £500 and itemised bills (Arts 11–12) | 9 months | 12 months |
| Written prescriptions, awareness, flyer, own-brand disclosure (Arts 14–17) | 9 months | 12 months |
| Data to the RCVS for Find a Vet (Art 10) | 3 months after the RCVS complies with its Undertakings, or 12 months from the Order — whichever is later | |
Two figures from this package are worth having in the budget now. The CMA's current estimate of the RCVS levy is no more than £150 to £250 per practice for initial set-up and £450 to £550 a year per practice for ongoing costs, sized by the number of first opinion practices you own. And the written-estimate threshold is £500 including VAT, with the estimate rewritten whenever the cost is likely to rise by 20% or £500, whichever is lower; emergencies are the only exception. Our CMA compliance page takes the obligations one at a time.
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| Nine months and one day after the accounting period end | Corporation tax payment. The rate is 19% on profits up to £50,000 and 25% above £250,000, with marginal relief in between at a 3/200 standard fraction — an effective 26.5% on the slice between the two limits |
| Every time your company count changes | Re-check the associated companies divisor. Both limits are divided by one plus the number of associated companies. A practice company alongside a property company and a locum service company means dividing by three: the limits become £16,667 and £83,333. Association can arise through substantial commercial interdependence — financial, economic and organisational links — not only through shareholdings |
| Twelve months after the accounting period end | Company tax return filing deadline, which is three months after the money was due. The payment date is the one that bites |
| At least once every 12 months | Confirmation statement at Companies House, on the company's own cycle. Accounts are filed there too and are publicly visible — which is the one genuine privacy argument a traditional partnership still has over a company |
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| One month and seven days after each quarter end | VAT return filed and paid, under Making Tax Digital for VAT. Every VAT-registered business is already in scope |
| Within 30 days of the end of the month you crossed it | Register for VAT if rolling 12-month taxable turnover has passed £90,000. Registration takes effect from the first day of the second month after the breach. The threshold has applied since 1 April 2024 |
| Inside the 30-day period itself | The forward look: if you expect to exceed £90,000 in the next 30 days alone, register by the end of that period, with effect from the date you formed the expectation |
The rate question is worth being precise about, because practices are often told the answer with more confidence than the source material supports. Medicines are clear: VAT Notice 701/15 para 9.4 states that medicines are not covered by the zero rate even where administered in an animal's feed, and HMRC's test is that a product with a VMD marketing authorisation is a medicine. Services are an inference rather than a quotation: the medical exemption in Schedule 9 Group 7 of the VAT Act 1994 covers registered doctors, dentists, opticians, pharmacists and other human health professionals, veterinary surgeons are not within it, and no other relief reaches veterinary services — so the standard 20% rate applies because nothing exempts or zero-rates it. The gov.uk page listing VAT rates on different goods and services has no veterinary entry at all. Pet care plans are a genuinely open question, and one the CMA has made more pressing by requiring plan components to be priced and published: whether a plan is a single standard-rated supply, a mixed supply, or contains an insurance element is not addressed in any HMRC guidance we can point you to, so it is a conversation rather than a lookup.
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| On or before each payday | Real time information full payment submission to HMRC |
| 22nd of the month | PAYE and National Insurance payment when paying electronically, or the 19th by post. Employer National Insurance is 15% above a £5,000 secondary threshold, with the £10,500 Employment Allowance available to employers who qualify |
| 31 May | P60s to every employee for the tax year just ended |
| 6 July | P11D and P11D(b) for benefits in kind, with Class 1A National Insurance due on those benefits at 15%. Class 1B on PAYE Settlement Agreements is also 15% |
| 1 April 2026 | National Living Wage rises to £12.71 for 21 and over, £10.85 for 18 to 20, and £8.00 for under 18s and apprentices. Re-run every affected contract, and check the pay of anyone whose birthday moves them between bands |
| Every pay run | Auto-enrolment assessment. The earnings trigger is £10,000 a year and qualifying earnings start at £6,240 — which matters in a practice with a lot of part-time nursing and reception hours |
The employment-law dates are on the nurses and practice teams page in full. Three of them are worth carrying here: the Employment Tribunal claim time limit extends from three months to six on 1 October 2026; the duty to take all reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment, together with liability for harassment by third parties, arrives on 30 October 2026; and the unfair dismissal qualifying period drops to six months in January 2027, with uncapped compensatory awards. Statutory sick pay already changed on 6 April 2026, with the Lower Earnings Limit and the waiting period both removed.
| When | What has to happen |
|---|---|
| 31 January | Online return for the tax year that ended the previous 5 April, plus the balancing payment for that year and the first payment on account for the current one |
| 31 July | Second payment on account. This is the one that catches a locum in their second year: the first year carries no payments on account, so year two arrives as a balancing payment plus two instalments inside twelve months |
| 7 August | First Making Tax Digital quarterly update, covering 6 April to 5 July |
| 7 November | Second quarterly update, covering 6 April to 5 October — the periods are cumulative from 6 April, not three separate quarters |
| 7 February | Third quarterly update, covering 6 April to 5 January |
| 7 May | Fourth quarterly update, covering the full year to 5 April |
Making Tax Digital for Income Tax began on 6 April 2026 for anyone with qualifying income over £50,000, tested on the 2024/25 return. The threshold falls to £30,000 from 6 April 2027, tested on 2025/26, and to £20,000 from 6 April 2028, tested on 2026/27. Around 780,000 people are in the first tranche. Two points decide whether a locum is caught. Qualifying income is gross income from self-employment and property, before allowances and expenses — turnover, not profit. And a locum working through a limited company is outside the regime entirely, because it applies to sole traders and landlords rather than to companies. Exemptions exist, digital exclusion among them. Updates can be sent any time from the end of the period to the deadline, and up to ten days early if no further transactions are expected.
The 2026 revaluation took effect on 1 April 2026, using rents at the 1 April 2024 antecedent valuation date; the new rateable values were published on 26 November 2025. There are now five multipliers: standard 48.0p, small business 43.2p where the rateable value does not exceed £50,999, high-value 50.8p at £500,000 and above, and two lower retail, hospitality and leisure multipliers of 43.0p and 38.2p.
A veterinary practice is not a retail, hospitality and leisure property. It pays 48.0p or 43.2p, not the lower RHL multipliers. Any reporting that framed the April 2026 changes as a business rates cut was describing somebody else's premises. A redesigned Transitional Relief scheme phases revaluation increases over three years.
Print it, or save it as a PDF from your browser's print dialogue — the navigation and the calls to action drop away and you are left with the dates. Then do the two things that make the rest of it easy. Put the annual medicines audit in the calendar with a named person against it, because it is the only item here that has no external prompt and no penalty date to remind you. And list every premises that stores or supplies medicines, with its registration renewal against it, so the 1 April fee is a line in the budget rather than a surprise.
If you would rather not run any of it yourself, that is what we are for. A free practice review will tell you which of these dates actually bite for your practice and which do not, and the calculators will put figures on the two that move real money: your margin, and your written-prescription revenue.
Fixed-fee accounting for veterinary businesses, with the accounts, tax, VAT, payroll, premises renewals and quarterly updates on this page tracked for you — and the pricing work done before the obligations arrive rather than after.
One short email: what has moved on the CMA remedies, the dates coming up, and one number worth checking in your practice. No spam, unsubscribe any time.