SNF Export for Preparing Self-Employed Tax Returns

Prepare sole trader self-assessments quickly using Coconut and your tax filing software in a few clicks.

Updated over a week ago

Are you filing self-assessments for your sole trader clients?

Coconut allows you to copy and paste summaries of transactions in one click by using SNF format. It means you can copy and paste the summaries directly into your major tax filing software like Taxfiler, Taxcalc and VT Software without having to do any mapping or calculations in Excel.

What is an SNF export?

SNF stands for Standard Name Format, a standard way to transfer data from accounting software to tax filing software. It was created by VTSoftware.

How do I use it?

1. Make sure the transactions are categorised correctly
On your transaction tab, you can filter by category, reviewed status or VAT rate to help you make sure the transactions are assigned correctly.

2. Click on Reports tab
Select Reports tab at the top of the Accountant Platform:

Screenshot of the tabs - at the top of the portal


​3. Select SNF report

This will open up a modal. Select the tax year that you want to copy the data for. Preview the data, and you can click 'copy'.

By default you can preview the last tax year displayed in the modal.

4. Import into your tax filing software

Log in to your tax filing software, and go to the input page for self-employment section of the self-assessment you are filing.

Simply paste the data in the relevant input field - and the tax filing software will incorporate the data from Coconut in one click.

They'll likely round the numbers to remove the digits after the decimal point to make it compatible for HMRC.

Instructions will depend on which tax filing software you are using (see below).

How are the SNF category totals calculated?

The categories associated with each transaction in Coconut are summarised and map to the SNF categories using the following mapping:

SNF category

Coconut category

BusinessName

Business name (legal)

PeriodEnding

End date for the period selected by the accountant in the Accountant Platform

Sales

Income, Reimbursements, Client refunds,

OtherIncome

Other income

CostOfSales

Equipment, materials, stock

SubcontractorCosts

N/A

EmployeeCosts

Subcontractors, Training

PremisesCosts

Venue Hire, Workspace

Repairs

Vehicles

GeneralAdmin

Phone, Postage, Stationery, Web hosting

Travel

Business Accommodation, Food & Drink, Fuel, Parking & Tolls, Travel

Advertising

Marketing

LegalAndProfessional

Accountancy, Consultants

BadDebts

N/A

Interest

Bank interest

OtherFinanceCharges

Bank fees

Depreciation

N/A

OtherExpenses

Equipment hire, insurance, other costs, software, subscriptions, uncategorised, work clothing

Which transactions are included?

We include all business transactions from your client's Coconut account.

For sole traders, this includes:

  • any transactions in accounts specified as their 'business' account

  • any transactions in accounts specified as their 'personal' account (or a 'mix of both') and the client has assigned a category to the transaction

This does NOT include:

  • any transactions in accounts specified as their 'personal' account (or a 'mix of both') and the client has associated the category 'Personal'

  • any transactions in accounts specified as their 'personal' account (or a 'mix of both') and the client has not selected whether it is a business or personal transaction

For Limited Companies, it only includes business transactions.
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Which tax software supports SNF imports?

The following software supports imports of our SNF export:

If you need more help, please feel free to email us!

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