7 VAT-Alert Apps Makers Swear By in 2025
Stop worrying about the £90 k line these tools flash red before HMRC does.
Your mugs sell out at the craft fair, Etsy pings all night…and suddenly your rolling 12-month sales are flirting with the VAT cliff.
One missed calculation can turn a cosy side-hustle into a 20 % price hike nobody planned for.
A quick net-vs-gross sanity check on VATCalc.onl shows exactly how much hidden tax you’ve stacked up.
VAT vs. Sales Tax: Key differences and why they matter—Explore Comparison
Radar lives inside FreeAgent and fires push-notifications the moment your rolling revenue nears the VAT line—handy if you juggle weekend markets and online drops.
Best for: UK sole traders who already bank with NatWest/Mettle (you get FreeAgent free).
Open the Countingup app and you’ll see real-time profit, VAT owed, and personalised “deadline” nudges—no spreadsheets, no switching tabs.
Editing receipts on the go means no more Sunday-night photo dumps.
Bokio’s free tier lets you record sales, auto-calculate VAT, and fire off an HMRC-ready return in a couple of clicks perfect if your margins are still wafer-thin.
Sneaky perk: smart invoice builder that flags overdue customers before cash-flow pinches.
Use vatcalc.onl for an on-the-spot gross-to-net check when haggling at craft stalls.
Claim Your GST/HST Credit: See 2025 payment amounts and eligibility—Check Eligibility
Whether you sell on Folksy or face-to-face, KashFlow’s widget tracks your rolling 12 months and changes colour when you’re close, at, or over the limit.
Accountants love it: the same alert appears in their portal, so they shout too.
Ship candles to Germany? Quaderno maps sales across 12 000+ jurisdictions and pushes proactive alerts the instant any country’s VAT trigger is hit.
Curiosity gap: It even tracks US state “economic nexus” rules for craft-show tourists.
Plug Xenon into Xero and it pings you when turnover is within 10 % of the threshold—or the second you breach it—so you can register before penalties pile up.
Bonus: also flags cash-flow gaps and missing purchase VAT.
Etsy/Amazon fees make your books messy. Link My Books pipes every payout into Xero or QuickBooks and auto-groups items by VAT rate so none slip past HMRC.
Saved one seller £8 829 in mis-coded VAT last year—yes, really.
VAT on Discounts Demystified: Understand how sales and coupons affect your bill—View Slides
Quick-Glance Fit Finder
Side-hustle potter on NatWest? Pick FreeAgent—it lets you snap net-to-gross figures in seconds.
Running a mobile food stall with no laptop? Go for Countingup—you can price new menu items on the spot.
Shoestring jewellery start-up? Choose Bokio—double-check your post-VAT margins before you list.
Bookkeeper-managed craft studio? Stick with KashFlow—verify its built-in widget alerts.
Cross-border knitwear shipper? Adopt Quaderno—convert unfamiliar VAT rates confidently.
Xero-heavy artisan collective? Add Xenon Connect—sanity-check its buffer alerts.
High-volume Etsy seller? Plug in Link My Books—spot-audit marketplace fees quickly.
Pro tip: set your alert at 80 % of today’s £90 k VAT line so stock-up season doesn’t ambush you.
Stop Overpaying LLC Taxes: Learn how to save on your 2025 filings—Save Today
Automate with AI in 2025: Discover how to streamline your VAT returns—Read on Medium