When you transfer shares in your own company today, the process is almost Victorian. You fill in a paper stock transfer form, post it to HMRC's Stamp Office, wait for it to come back physically stamped, and only then will Companies House register the new owner. I've watched that queue hold up a real buy-out for weeks while everyone stood around waiting for a stamp. On 13 July 2026 the government published draft legislation to bin it.
Here's where I land after reading the draft. Getting rid of the stamp office is genuinely good, and I won't pretend otherwise. But the price of that convenience is that the responsibility for getting a share transfer right, which used to sit with a clerk and a physical stamp, now sits squarely with you.
TL;DR: Ending HMRC's paper stamp office is a real improvement. But the new Securities Transfer Tax is self-assessed, which quietly moves the job of getting a share transfer right from a clerk onto you and your adviser. The £1,000 small-transfer freebie is gone, and reliefs you used to assume now have to be actively claimed.
So what is HMRC actually replacing?
The new Securities Transfer Tax (STT) folds two taxes into one. Right now a share transfer can attract either stamp duty, on paper transfers, or Stamp Duty Reserve Tax, on electronic ones. STT replaces both with a single, digital, self-assessed charge on transfers of chargeable securities, principally shares in UK-incorporated companies (GOV.UK, 2026).
The headline rate doesn't move. It stays at 0.5% on most transfers, with the higher 1.5% charge for clearance services and depositary receipt arrangements retained (Mayer Brown, 2026). Consideration will be rounded to the nearest penny rather than the current nearest £5. The consultation on the draft closes 7 September 2026, with the tax expected to take effect in 2027 (GOV.UK, 2026). The rate is the least interesting part of this reform. The change that matters is who now carries the risk of getting a transfer right.
The end of the stamp office is the welcome half
I'll lead with the good news because it's earned. A physical form, posted, stamped, and returned before ownership can change hands is exactly the kind of friction that turns a two-day deal into a three-week one, and I've sat in that queue more than once with a client wondering why a simple share move takes a month.
STT scraps the document-based charge. The tax is triggered by the transaction itself, broadly on substantial completion, you self-assess it and file online, and registration can move once HMRC acknowledges the return (Macfarlanes, 2026). For anyone who has waited on the Stamp Office, that's a real improvement and I'd say so without hedging. The problem is what comes attached to it.
Where does the risk actually move?
Onto the buyer. Under STT the purchaser self-assesses the charge and files it, within 14 days for electronic transactions and 30 days for other transfers (Macfarlanes, 2026). Right now the stamping process is a checkpoint: someone at HMRC looks at the form before anything registers. Take that away and the discipline the paper process imposed on you by force has to come from you by design instead.
The closest analogy every property client already knows is SDLT, which went the same way years ago and which people still get wrong precisely because self-assessment lulls you into thinking it's simple. This is the same shift I wrote about with HMRC seeing your card takings from 2028: the obligation doesn't change, but the responsibility for evidencing it lands on you. And self-assessment brings the penalty exposure that goes with it, which is worth reading next to where HMRC draws the careless-to-reckless line.
Who needs to care, and who can stop reading
Most directors can stop here. If you draw a salary and dividends and never touch the share register, nothing about your week changes. I'd rather say that plainly than manufacture alarm.
The people this reaches have a share transaction on the horizon: a co-founder buy-out, a family succession, an incorporation done by share-for-share exchange, an investor coming in, a group tidy-up. That's a broad slice of owner-managed practice. There are around 2.1 million actively trading limited companies in the UK, with more than 800,000 new incorporations a year (money.co.uk / Companies House, 2026), and a share transfer sits at the heart of almost every restructuring, exit, or succession they'll run. The plumbing they relied on is being rebuilt, which is the same lesson behind how a directors' loan survived a liquidation in Boulton: the mechanics matter more than the label.
What happens to the £1,000 small-transfer exemption?
It goes. Today a transfer where the consideration is £1,000 or less falls outside stamp duty. STT removes that de minimis entirely (EY, 2026).
That matters more for reporting than for tax. The small share moves that used to happen on a kitchen table, handing a slice of the company to a spouse or a key employee, become chargeable and, more to the point, reportable. The failure mode here isn't really the 0.5%, which on a modest transfer is trivial; it's the return nobody realised they had to file. A missed filing is a far more expensive mistake than a small charge, and this is exactly the kind of quiet obligation that catches honest people out.
Do group relief and share-for-share relief still apply?
Yes, but you have to claim them. The reliefs that make ordinary restructurings tax-neutral, group relief, demerger and reconstruction relief, and relief for inserting a new holding company via a share-for-share exchange, are broadly carried forward. Several of them, though, now require an active claim inside the STT return rather than simply applying (Mayer Brown, 2026).
This is the most audit-instinct point in the whole reform. A relief you have to claim is a relief you can forget to claim, and the way you turn a tax-neutral reorganisation into an accidental 0.5% bill is by assuming the relief is automatic and never making the claim. The person who documents the transaction and files the claim on time pays nothing. The person who "knew it was exempt" and didn't file is the one who gets the assessment. This is the same documentation discipline a year in audit taught me and it applies here with money attached.
What should you do before this starts?
Nothing dramatic today. This is draft legislation, the consultation runs to 7 September 2026, and it's expected to take effect in 2027, so the mechanics may still move before then (GOV.UK, 2026).
But if you've a share transaction coming, plan it knowing the process is about to change from posting a form to filing a self-assessed return. Build the working that justifies any relief as you go, and factor in that the little £1,000 exemption you might have leaned on is going. The lesson from SDLT is that "just fill in the form" taxes are the ones people underestimate, and shares are now heading the same way.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the new Securities Transfer Tax and does it replace stamp duty when I transfer shares in my company?
Yes. Securities Transfer Tax (STT) is a single, digital, self-assessed tax that replaces both stamp duty and Stamp Duty Reserve Tax on transfers of chargeable securities, mainly shares in UK-incorporated companies. The main 0.5% rate is retained, but the charge is filed online by the purchaser rather than by posting a paper form to HMRC's Stamp Office. It's expected to take effect in 2027.
I'm transferring a few shares to my spouse or a family member. Will I have to pay and report Securities Transfer Tax?
Quite possibly. The current £1,000 de minimis exemption, which kept many small transfers outside stamp duty, is being removed under STT. On a small transfer the 0.5% charge itself is minor, but the transfer becomes reportable, so the real risk is an online return you didn't realise you had to file. If you're moving even a handful of shares, check whether a return is now needed.
Do reliefs like group relief and share-for-share relief still apply under Securities Transfer Tax, and do I have to claim them?
The familiar reliefs, group relief, demerger and reconstruction relief, and relief for inserting a new holding company, are broadly carried forward. The change is that several will need an active claim made within the STT return rather than applying automatically. A genuinely tax-neutral reorganisation can become a chargeable one if the claim is missed, so document the transaction and make the claim on time.
When does Securities Transfer Tax start, and do I need to do anything now?
STT is still draft legislation. The technical consultation closes on 7 September 2026 and the tax is expected to take effect in 2027, so nothing needs doing today. If you have a share transaction on the horizon, though, plan it on the basis that the process is moving to a self-assessed online return, the £1,000 exemption is going, and reliefs will need claiming rather than assuming.
If you've got a buy-out, incorporation, or group reorganisation coming up and want to understand how the move to a self-assessed share-transfer return changes the mechanics, get in touch. I'm happy to walk through where the risk sits in your specific transaction and how to document it properly.