British Telecommunications plc v HMRC

In British Telecommunications plc v HMRC [2023] EWCA Civ 1412 (4 December 2023) the CA struck out BT’s restitutionary claim for overpaid VAT holding that: (i) the statutory VAT bad debt relief scheme implemented by parliament was an exhaustive and exclusive remedy for bad debt relief claims and so precluded a common law restitutionary claim and (ii) for both the period prior to and after the scheme being implemented HMRC had not been unjustly enriched.

BT claimed it had overpaid VAT during the 1970s and 1980s as a result of the UK’s failure to properly implement Article 11C of EC Council Directive 77/388 of 17 May 1977 (the Sixth Directive) which provided for VAT bad debt relief. There was no domestic UK scheme for bad debt relief at all for the first nine months after the Sixth Directive was required to be implemented namely...

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