You focus on your R&D. Plio guides you through preparing your claim.
Preparing an R&D tax relief claim doesn't have to be complicated. Plio takes you through a clear, guided process — from setting up your business and explaining your R&D activities to organising your costs and reviewing your claim information.
At every stage, you stay in control. Lister AI helps you understand what information is needed, identify gaps and improve your explanations.
Start with the basics. We'll guide you through what you need.
Enter your business details and identify the people involved in your R&D activities.
Add your employees, relevant external workers and suppliers involved in R&D. Plio organises this information so it can be connected to your projects and costs later.
You only need to enter the information relevant to preparing your claim.
Keep your existing project management tools. Plio only needs the essentials.
Create a simple record for each R&D project, including its purpose, dates, technical field and the people involved.
You don't need to recreate your project plans, tasks or daily activities in Plio. Continue managing your work in your existing systems.
Plio focuses on collecting the information needed to explain and support your R&D tax relief claim.
Tell Plio what you were trying to achieve — and what you couldn't readily resolve.
Describe the technical challenges your project set out to overcome.
Plio guides you through identifying the scientific or technological uncertainties involved and connecting them to your R&D project.
You don't need to write a formal technical report to get started. Begin with your own explanation of the work.
Your technical knowledge, supported by AI-powered guidance.
Plio takes you through structured R&D evidence questions covering your project's aims, existing knowledge, technological advances, uncertainties, investigations and outcomes.
You provide the initial answers based on your actual work.
Lister AI reviews your explanations, compares relevant technical claims with published scientific and technological research, identifies missing information and recommends improvements.
You can review, edit and adopt the suggested answers before moving forward.
You provide the facts. Lister AI helps you explain them.
Explore Lister AI →Bring your costs together without changing how you manage your finances.
Enter or upload your actual costs for each month, including relevant employee costs, external worker and supplier costs, and other potentially qualifying R&D expenditure.
You can continue using your existing payroll, accounting and purchasing systems.
Plio helps you bring the relevant financial information together in one place for your claim preparation.
Understand which costs may qualify and document your calculations.
Not every project cost necessarily qualifies for R&D tax relief.
Plio helps you review your expenditure, identify potentially qualifying costs and record the proportion attributable to your R&D activities.
Lister AI provides guidance on cost categories and the information needed to support your proposed allocations.
For example, where an employee worked partly on R&D and partly on other activities, you can record the proposed R&D percentage and its justification.
You remain responsible for checking that the costs and allocations are accurate and supportable.
Read about qualifying R&D expenditure →Bring your technical explanations and R&D costs together for final approval.
Plio brings together your project information, technical explanations, supporting evidence and proposed qualifying expenditure into a structured R&D claim preparation package.
Review the information, check the figures and make any necessary corrections before approving the final version.
The aim is to give your business a clear, organised set of information to support its R&D tax relief claim.
Your claim. Your decision.
Once your information is ready, decide how you want to proceed.
You can use the prepared information to support your own HMRC submission or provide it to your accountant or R&D tax adviser.
Plio helps you prepare and organise the information. It does not submit the claim to HMRC on your behalf.
You stay in control of the final decision and submission.
Already managing your projects in another system? Using accounting software for payroll and supplier costs?
Keep using them.
Plio is designed to help you prepare your R&D tax relief claim, not replace the tools you already rely on.
Create only the project information needed for the claim, bring in your relevant costs and follow the guided preparation process.
Less duplication. A clearer path to claim preparation.
Choose the level of R&D management that suits your business. Start with claim preparation using your existing records, add team time recording, or manage your complete R&D projects and purchasing in Plio.
Prepare R&D evidence and qualifying costs using your existing records.
Everything in Claim, plus time recording for your R&D team.
Everything in Team, plus R&D project planning, purchasing, Phase Gate management and budget control.
Lister AI supports you throughout the preparation process.
It helps you explain scientific or technological uncertainties, compare your work with published research, identify gaps in your supporting evidence and improve your technical answers.
It also provides guidance when reviewing potentially qualifying R&D costs.
Lister AI provides recommendations for your consideration. Your business reviews and approves the information before using it in a claim.
Discover Lister AINo. Plio only requires the project information relevant to preparing your R&D tax relief claim. You can continue managing your projects in your existing software. If you would rather manage your R&D projects in Plio, the Business plan adds project management, purchasing, Phase Gate and budgets. Time recording for your R&D team is available from the Team plan.
No. Plio guides you through the preparation process with structured questions and Lister AI recommendations. You are still responsible for ensuring your claim is accurate, and you can seek advice from a tax expert if needed.
Yes. You can use Plio to organise information about past R&D activities, provided you have sufficient records to support the explanations and costs and remain within the applicable claim deadlines. We recommend recording actual R&D project costs every month, so your evidence reflects data captured while the project is in progress rather than reconstructed from memory after it has finished.
Lister AI reviews the information you provide and recommends improved explanations. You decide whether to adopt or edit them.
Plio's cost preparation workflow allows you to bring in relevant cost information without replacing your accounting system.
No. Plio prepares the information to support your claim. You decide whether to handle the HMRC submission yourself or ask your accountant or tax advisor to do it.
Start with the basics. Follow the guidance. Prepare your claim information with confidence.
Plio takes you step by step through your R&D projects, technical explanations and costs — with Lister AI to help along the way.
Plio supports claim preparation. It does not determine eligibility, guarantee HMRC acceptance or submit claims on your behalf.