In Bratt Autoservices Company v HMRC [2018] EWCA Civ 1106 (18 May 2018) the Court of Appeal found that a repayment claim under VATA 1994 s 80 must refer to a prescribed accounting period.
Following two CJEU decisions Elida Gibbs (Case C-317/94) and Italian Republic (Case C-45/95) Bratt had made a claim for the recovery of output tax incorrectly accounted for. Bratt’s letter included a copy of its accounts for the year ended 1989 and a calculation of the claim for that year; £1 293 750 based on the method used in Elida Gibbs. The letter suggested that the claim could be calculated on a similar basis for each of the years for which audited accounts were available extrapolating the claim backwards for each period of trading. HMRC considered that the letter did not constitute a claim for the purpose of s 80 because it...
