If you’re self employed or run your small business in a partnership, it’s likely you’ve had a weight on your shoulders which has been growing over the last few weeks. This Friday (January 31) is the deadline for self-assessment tax returns relating to the 2012-2013 tax year.

If you’ve left it until the last minute, you’re not the only one - last year HMRC was at its busiest on deadline day, when the tax authority received nearly 578,000 returns.

If you run your own business and are eligible for self-assessment, you’ve probably had very little time to dedicate to your tax affairs - especially if you’re one of those entrepreneurs who chooses to handle all the business processes yourself. It may seem like you’ve had to become an expert in everything from marketing to management, customer service to finance.

In the future it may be wise to invest in an accountant to take some of the pressure off, but if you’re facing deadline day on your own, hope is not lost. As long as you’ve kept good records, it’s relatively easy to complete your self-assessment tax return online.

In the past five years the number of people filing their self-assessment tax return online has almost doubled to 7.9 million. The online service might not appeal to all, but is the only option for submitting your tax return on time at the last minute.

And there are a lot of places you can go for advice:

• HMRC itself is a good place to start shedding light on the administrative side of things.

• Money Supermarket also has some great advice listing the top five tips for filling in your tax return, including the documents you will need to gather.

• And Money Magpie has this great definitive guide, which includes handy insider tips you won’t find on any official government channels

So don’t put it off any longer - your tax return may seem like a chore, but there are plenty of helpful resources online to help you get it done quickly.