News 

"HMRC's Self Assessment online filing service has experienced technical difficulties this morning which has meant that some tax payers have experienced difficulties filing online," a HMRC statement claims.

"The system is now rapidly returning to normal levels of service. A record number of 3.6 million taxpayers have already successfully filed online with 104,000 filing today."

"HMRC takes any disruption of service very seriously and to reflect this no-one who files electronically or by paper by midnight Friday 1 February will face a penalty."

The website's failure is a huge embarrassment for the HMRC, which has spent heavily on a television and print campaign to remind people to meet the deadline.

A message on the website reads, "we are currently aware that some customers may be experiencing problems with this service and are working with our IT service provider to give this our urgent attention. If you are experiencing problems please try again later. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause."