You can get FreeAgent bookkeeping software free for your mortgage advice business if you hold an eligible business bank account with Mettle, NatWest or Royal Bank of Scotland. FreeAgent normally costs £33 per month plus VAT for a limited company, so qualifying could save you £396 a year before VAT.
Free bookkeeping software for a mortgage advice business is available through bank-funded FreeAgent accounts. If you hold an eligible Mettle, NatWest or Royal Bank of Scotland business account, the core FreeAgent software costs nothing per month. You do not have to switch all your banking, and you keep full accountant access to your records.
Free accounting software through your bank. Eligible advisers get the core FreeAgent software free with Mettle, NatWest or RBS business banking.
Up to £396 saved each year. The standard limited company subscription is £33 a month plus VAT, which works out at £396 a year before VAT.
No monthly software subscription. The core software stays free while you meet the bank conditions. Optional extras may cost extra.
Bank feeds do the boring bit. Connected bank transactions cut manual entry and keep a clean digital audit trail for HMRC.
Built for commission income. Record lender procuration fees, broker fees, network deductions and protection commission in separate categories.
Software is not an accountant. FreeAgent organises your records, but judgement on VAT exemption, clawbacks and tax still needs a professional.
Most mortgage advisers I speak to are not short of software options. They are short of reasons to pay for one. A single adviser firm can easily spend several hundred pounds a year on subscriptions before a penny goes on compliance, insurance or networking. When margins are set by lender procuration fee rates you cannot control, the small recurring costs are the ones worth attacking.
There is a second reason this matters more for mortgage advisers than for many other trades. The majority of mortgage intermediary services are exempt from VAT. If your income is exempt, VAT you pay on business expenses is generally not recoverable. That means a software subscription really does cost you the full gross amount, whereas a VAT registered business selling standard rated services would recover a fifth of it. For an exempt adviser, free software is worth more than it first appears.
If you are still weighing up whether to trade as a sole trader or through a company, our guide on sole trader or limited company for a mortgage adviser explains how the structure affects both your tax and your record keeping duties.
FreeAgent is UK cloud bookkeeping and accounting software built for sole traders, limited companies and small partnerships. It records transactions, tracks income and spending, reconciles your bank account and organises the information your accountant needs for annual accounts and tax returns. It is not tied to one bank, so you can use it whatever account you hold.
Mortgage advice income is awkward to record well. It arrives from lenders, networks, protection providers and clients at different times. Clawbacks reverse money months after it landed. Network charges reduce gross commission before it reaches your account. A spreadsheet will do it, but only if you are disciplined every month.
| FreeAgent feature | Benefit for mortgage advisers |
|---|---|
| Income tracking | Record mortgage commissions, procuration fees and client fees separately |
| Expense management | Categorise business costs and attach supporting documents |
| Bank feeds | Import eligible bank transactions automatically |
| Bank reconciliation | Match receipts and payments against your accounting records |
| Invoicing | Issue and track invoices for client fees and other services |
| Financial reports | Monitor income, expenses, profitability and cash flow |
| VAT returns | Prepare and submit VAT returns where you are registered |
| Payroll | Run supported monthly payroll and HMRC submissions |
| Accountant access | Let your accountant review and manage your records directly |
A worked example. You receive £2,500 in lender commission, pay £300 in network charges and spend £150 on sourcing software. Good software lets you see all three, and shows the effect on profit. But how gross commission, network deductions and clawbacks should be treated depends on your agreements and your accounting policy, which is where an accountant earns their fee.
A mortgage adviser using the standard FreeAgent limited company plan pays £33 per month plus VAT, which is £396 a year before VAT. If you qualify for the bank-funded subscription, the core software costs nothing, so the saving is effectively the whole subscription. Sole traders and different plans will see slightly different figures, but the principle is the same.
| Cost comparison | Amount |
|---|---|
| Standard monthly subscription | £33 plus VAT |
| Annual subscription cost | £396 plus VAT |
| Eligible bank-funded core subscription | £0 |
| Potential annual saving | £396 plus VAT |
The saving is based on the standard limited company subscription before any introductory discount. What you actually save depends on your business type, the plan you would otherwise choose and your VAT position. If your mortgage advice services are VAT exempt, the full £396 is a genuine cash saving, because you cannot usually reclaim the VAT on costs linked to exempt supplies.
Be careful with the phrase free. Free software does not mean free banking, and it does not mean every optional feature is included. You still need to understand your account's transaction charges and any paid add-ons.
Three banking routes open the door to the free subscription for eligible business customers. Each has its own conditions, and the account should belong to your business, not to you personally. That is especially important if you trade through a limited company.
A NatWest Group business account for small businesses with no standard monthly account fee. You must make at least one transaction to or from the account every month to keep free FreeAgent access.
Monthly activity condition applies
Eligible business current account customers can access FreeAgent without a separate core software subscription. Normal account and transaction fees may still apply.
Must hold a qualifying account
RBS business current account holders can access the core software at no additional subscription cost, subject to maintaining an eligible account. Ulster Bank customers in Northern Ireland may also qualify.
Conditions apply to the account
Not sure which business account suits a new company? Our guide on choosing a business bank account for a limited company covers documents, fees and why we recommend Mettle for straightforward firms.
Claiming the free subscription takes a short series of steps: confirm you hold an eligible Mettle, NatWest or RBS business account, activate FreeAgent through that bank, enter your business and VAT details, then connect the bank feed. Most advisers can complete it in a single sitting, though bank verification can add a delay.
Confirm your mortgage advice business holds a qualifying Mettle, NatWest or RBS account. If you already have one, you may not need to open anything new. If you trade through a limited company, the account should be in the company's name.
If you need a new account, complete the bank's application. Expect to provide company details, identification and business information. Approval depends on the bank's own eligibility checks, which we cannot influence.
Mettle customers can usually activate through the app by choosing the FreeAgent connection. NatWest and RBS customers follow their bank's activation instructions. If you already pay for FreeAgent, ask about switching to the bank-funded arrangement rather than paying twice.
Add your business name and address, sole trader or limited company status, accounting year end, bank details, VAT registration status, opening balances and tax settings. Get the opening balances right, or every report afterwards will be slightly wrong.
Link your eligible business account so transactions import automatically. Check the connection periodically, because bank feeds do lapse, and a lapsed feed quietly creates gaps in your records.
Set up income categories for lender commission, broker fees and protection commission, and expense categories for network charges, FCA fees and software. Then give your accountant access so the records are reviewed as you go.
Record each commission stream in its own income category, and keep the lender or network statement behind it. Gross commission, network deductions and clawbacks should be visible separately, not netted into one bank receipt. That way your turnover reflects what you actually earned, not just what happened to land in the account.
Where advisers get caught out. A lender reports £1,200 of gross commission, the network deducts £180, and £1,020 reaches your bank. If you record only £1,020, your turnover and your expense claim are both understated. Whether the £180 belongs in your accounts as a deduction or sits outside your turnover depends on your contractual arrangements, so ask before you decide.
There is more detail in our guide to the business records mortgage advisers must keep for HMRC, including how long to retain statements and the penalties for gaps.
Yes, and in fact most mortgage advisers are in this position. Many qualifying mortgage intermediary services are exempt from VAT, including certain lender commission and client fee arrangements. FreeAgent works perfectly well for exempt businesses; you simply configure it so you are not charging VAT you should not charge.
The trap is assuming everything you do is exempt. Separately supplied services such as consultancy, marketing support, lead generation or advice-only work can have different VAT treatment. If you make both taxable and exempt supplies, partial exemption rules may restrict how much VAT you can recover on costs. HMRC sets out the boundary in VAT Notice 701/49: Finance.
Before you touch VAT settings in any software, settle the treatment of your income streams. Getting that wrong is far more expensive than a subscription. Our page on accountants for mortgage advisers sets out how we handle VAT, commission and structure questions for firms like yours.
Yes. FreeAgent is Making Tax Digital compatible, which matters if you are a self-employed adviser drawn into MTD for Income Tax. That regime requires digital records and quarterly updates to HMRC, and it is phased in by income threshold rather than arriving all at once.
| Start date | Qualifying gross income |
|---|---|
| 6 April 2026 | Over £50,000 |
| 6 April 2027 | Over £30,000 |
| 6 April 2028 | Over £20,000 |
Those thresholds are based on qualifying gross income from self-employment and property before expenses are deducted. Advisers trading through a limited company are not in MTD for Income Tax for the company's income. VAT registered firms still follow MTD for VAT rules. HMRC publishes the detail in its Making Tax Digital for Income Tax guidance.
If quarterly filing is new to you, our guide on whether you need bookkeeping for your mortgage advice business explains what HMRC actually requires, and where monthly bookkeeping stops being optional in practice.
The core software is genuinely free for customers who meet the bank-funded conditions. What is not free is everything around it. Banking charges, optional software features and professional accountancy work all sit outside the free subscription, and eligibility can be lost if the underlying account changes.
Your business account may carry transaction fees or paid add-ons even where there is no monthly account fee.
Mettle customers must make at least one transaction per month to keep the free subscription.
Some extras, such as enhanced receipt capture, carry an additional charge.
Free software does not include professional tax advice, annual accounts or bookkeeping services.
If you close the qualifying bank account or stop meeting its conditions, subscription charges can become payable if you keep using the software. Check the current bank and FreeAgent terms before you apply.
Yes, in most cases. Software records what happened. An accountant decides what it means. Preparing annual accounts, filing Corporation Tax and Self Assessment returns, handling partial exemption, reviewing allowable expenses and planning director salaries and dividends are judgement calls, not data entry.
The arrangement that works best for the advisers we look after is simple. They keep the day-to-day records tidy in FreeAgent, and we review the numbers, prepare the year end accounts and tax returns and flag anything that looks wrong. That usually costs less than paying someone to reconstruct a year of commission statements in January.
A larger brokerage with several advisers, layered commission arrangements, heavy clawbacks and detailed management reporting needs more than entry-level software. The right system is the one that matches your reporting needs, not the one with the longest feature list. If you are weighing up plan costs generally, our FreeAgent online accountants page and pricing page set out what each fixed fee includes.
The questions mortgage advisers ask us most often about free bookkeeping software and the bank-funded FreeAgent offer.
If you are paying for accounting software and you could hold an eligible Mettle, NatWest or RBS business account, the maths is hard to argue with. Up to £396 a year before VAT is real money, and for VAT exempt advisers it is money you cannot reclaim. The setup is a couple of hours, not a project.
What free software will not do is fix sloppy records. If commission statements sit in an inbox, if clawbacks never get posted, if the bank feed quietly lapsed in March, then you have saved £396 on software and lost more than that in unreconciled income. The saving only sticks when the records behind it are clean.
My honest advice to advisers asking about this is to do both things at once. Move to the free subscription, and use the moment to review how you record commission, network charges and expenses. That combination is where the real saving sits.
We are FreeAgent accredited expert accountants with around twenty years of experience in UK accounting and taxation, and we work with mortgage advisers and brokerage companies all year round. We can check whether you qualify for free FreeAgent, set it up properly, connect your bank feeds, agree sensible income and expense categories, review how lender commission and network deductions are recorded, and confirm the VAT treatment of your income before it causes a problem.
Book a free consultation and we will check whether you qualify for the bank-funded FreeAgent subscription, tell you what it will save you, and set out a fixed monthly fee for ongoing support if you want the records handled for you.
Written and reviewed by the qualified team at Taxwise Accountancy, ACCA, AAT and IFA qualified accountants with around twenty years of experience supporting UK businesses, contractors and professional advisers. You can also browse our free accounting resources or see what clients say on our reviews page.
Information reviewed in November 2026. FreeAgent pricing, bank eligibility conditions, account fees and optional features can change. This article gives general information about UK bookkeeping, software and tax for mortgage advice businesses. It is not a substitute for advice on your own circumstances. Always check the current terms with the relevant bank and FreeAgent before applying.