Supreme Court (UK)

Recent cases

Taxable amount – Taxpayer charging fee for participation in bingo sessions – Tax payer recalculating liability to tax in accordance with business brief and Notice published by HMRC – Taxpayer giving effect to recalculation by issuing an internal credit note – Taxpayer making retrospective claim for over payment of tax – whether recalculation resulted in a ‘decrease in consideration for a supply which includes an amount of VAT’ within the meaning of Regulation 38 – Appeal dismissed

Selected cases

VAT – whether the promoter of a loyalty scheme is entitled to input tax for payments made to retailers of goods who participate in the scheme and provide goods to customers who redeem points
Case analysis – here

INPUT TAX – tripartite agreement entered into by the Respondent, a number of financial institutions and PricewaterhouseCoopers whose fee was to be paid for by the Respondent–whether input tax of the Respondent – no
Case Analysis
Court of Appeal decision – AirTours Holidays Transport Ltd v Revenue and Customs [2013] EWCA Civ 1033

Taxable amount – Taxpayer charging fee for participation in bingo sessions – Tax payer recalculating liability to tax in accordance with business brief and Notice published by HMRC – Taxpayer giving effect to recalculation by issuing an internal credit note – Taxpayer making retrospective claim for over payment of tax – whether recalculation resulted in a ‘decrease in consideration for a supply which includes an amount of VAT’ within the meaning of Regulation 38 – Appeal dismissed

whether taxpayers entitled to compound interest on the repayment of overpaid VAT – appeal dismissed

whether a scheme relating to demonstrator cars used by retail distributors for test drives and other internal purposes whereby input tax credits could be recovered on the purchase of the car but output tax was voided when the car was sold second hand to a consumer was an abuse of law – discussion of the application of the principle of abuse of law to tax avoidance schemes – whether the essential aim was to obtain a tax advantage

whether the revenue from electronic slot machines used for gaming resulting from the provision of a “gaming machine” as defined and more particularly whether for the purposes of that definition the element of chance in the game was “provided by means of the machine” or by an outside agency of some kind – if not, the takings were exempt – the machines were terminals connected to a central network but the element of chance was provided “by means of” the action of the player pressing the button and generating the winning or losing combination – the terminal was therefore the active means by which the element of chance was created

whether the supply of education to students was exempt from VAT as supplies made by a college or university – whether the appellant was a college of Middlesex University
factors relevant to assessing whether a body is a college of a university

whether company which markets and arranges holiday accommodation though an on-line website and the essential question was whether the appellant was acting as a principal, or as an agent, when making the supplies of hotel accommodation
Case analysis – here

whether motor vehicle repairers making supply of repair services to company who pays the repair costs instead of, or as well as, to the insured
Case analysis – here
Orders made – [2013] UKSC 15

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