Is there a (legal?) reason why a 'VAT receipt' must be specifically asked for when paying for fuel? I need to keep them for my book-keeping, and have occasionally forgotten one.
Why can't the VAT element be shown on the receipt normally issued?
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No VAT receipt and you will be unable to reclaim any VAT back on the fuel. My bookkeeper (used to work for the revenue) always insists on it
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Some service stations do put the VAT number on the normal receipt, but I found that Morrisons supermarket don't for some odd reason. However, I also forgot to ask for a couple, but went in months later and they wrote me the VAT receipts out based on the old (normal) receipts I did have.
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OP is asking why 9/10 fuel stations give you a reciept that says "this is not a VAT reciept", why the hell can't they just give everyone a VAT reciept and be done with it?
I don't know the answer.
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I don't know the answer.
It's a direction from The Revenue to stop people collecting unused receipts blowing around the forecourt and claiming the VAT back.
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Aha! Thanks, BP - I thought it might be something like that.
Of course, if people forget the VAT receipt and don't bother to (rightfully) reclaim the tax, then HMRC are even hapiier, aren't they!!
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>>It's a direction from The Revenue to stop people collecting unused receipts blowing around the forecourt and claiming the VAT back.
But we have just been told two posts up that all you have to do is take the ordinary receipt inside and they will give you a VAT receipt.
Also anybody can ask for a VAT receipt - you don't have to prove that you are buying the fuel for business rather than personal use.
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But we have just been told two posts up that all you have to do is take the ordinary receipt inside and they will give you a VAT receipt.
OK, so 'stop' wasn't the right word. It just makes it a little more awkward.
I was told the reason by our local garage owner quite a few years ago - I always used to ask for written receipts but one day he told me he'd been instructed not to give people multiple receipts, and to only issue VAT receipts on request.
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I travel intermittentl on business and we are encouraged to provide the occasional VAT receipt even though it might bear no relation to the miles travevlled for work. For example I might already have a full tank and drive 50 miles on business, then empty the tank on personal use. On reflling to a full tank I can then ask for a VAT receipt and submit it with my mileage claim for the 50 miles. There is absolutley no chance of this being a scam (we are a high profile company) and I can only put it down to a jobsworth mentality somewhere in the tax system. After all, unlesss you are a farmer, all road fuel is subject to tax at the point of sale so the whole thing seems pointless. Basically if I say i've done 50 miles and my boss authorises it waht relevance does a receipt for a much greater amount of fuel have? I stand to be corrected if a backroomer who understands these issues can explain!
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I find myself in a similar situation to catsdad and have also concluded that it must be to keep the jobsworths busy.
The official reason is so that that the company can show some evidence that vat has been paid on fuel in order to make the appropriate claim for a refund. But I have yet to come across a petrol station anywhere in the UK where I can buy fuel WITHOUT paying vat.
This whole stupid exercise must be generating mountains of paper. Whatever happened to common sense? Grumpy - moi?
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Our local poundstore "Insight" iirc is doing a wierd offer, if you give them a petrol receipt for over £5 you get a pound off. Whats that all about?
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I am self-employed and do the optional fuel VAT recovery/scale charge scheme.
I pay by credit card and the card receipt and the fuel receipt are printed separately- the latter on request . They won't issue the VAT number on both as people might submit both for recovery- which is why one says it's not a VAT receipt.
For the garage's records the "original" receipt is stored on their system , irrespective of whether the customer asks for a copy.
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I travel intermittentl on business and we are encouraged to provide the occasional VAT receipt even though it might bear no relation to the miles travevlled for work. For example I might already have a full tank and drive 50 miles on business, then empty the tank on personal use. On reflling to a full tank I can then ask for a VAT receipt and submit it with my mileage claim for the 50 miles. There is absolutley no chance of this being a scam (we are a
high profile company) and I can only put it down to a jobsworth mentality somewhere in the tax system. After all, unlesss you are a farmer, all road fuel is subject to tax at the point of sale so the whole thing seems pointless. Basically if I say i've done 50 miles and my boss authorises it waht relevance does a receipt for a much greater amount of fuel have? I stand to be corrected if a backroomer who understands these issues can explain!
The explanation is that up until 2006 businesses were able to claim VAT in relation to the petrol element of the business mileage claims (in your case the petrol used to travel 50 miles, which is calculated at around 11p mile, so the VAT would be 50x11x7/47=£0.82 - www.hmrc.gov.uk/cars/advisory_fuel_current.htm ).
Last year the UK was taken to court by Europe, who said that the practice was illegal. The argument was that the business was not buying the fuel, the employee was, demonstrated by the fact that the business did not have a VAT receipt, and as it did not have a receipt it could not recover the VAT. This would have meant that either UK businesses did not recover the VAT on business mileage driven by their employees, or they would have had to issue all their employees with fuel cards so the company bought the petrol. So either increased costs as no VAT recovery or the expense and difficulty of operating a fuel card for employees private cars (let alone the income tax issues).
Rather than just rolling over, the UK government and HMRC came up with a 'scheme' that allowed UK businesses to carry on recover the VAT on business mileage. This involved reading the ECJ judgement rather literally, and coming to the conclusion that if a business had a VAT receipt for petrol on which a business mileage claim could be made (if the receipt covers more fuel than the business mileage, then the VAT claim is still restricted to the petrol element of the business miles).
So yes it is a bit 'jobsworth' but it keeps the UK one step ahead of Europe.
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The guidelines given by my company where we want to claim business miles in our own cars is that we need to submit a receipt(s) with a total VAT value of at least 1p per mile claimed. So you claim for 100 business miles you need a reciept with at least £1.75 worth of VAT on it. Presumably that 1p per mile is a nominal amount to prove that the mileage was done and the VAT can be re-claimed. We had to start doing this from April last year.
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same here daiking - we need VAT receipts which show enough VAT paid to at least cover the amount being reclaimed. In a twist of irony this has totally screwed up our mileage claim procedure which was supposed to become paperless from Monday! We are going from a manual system which was easy as you kept the sheet in the car, and handed it in at the end of a period with VAT receipts. Now we need to fill the sheet, enter it onto the computer, get it approved electronically, print it out, get it signed by person who approved it and send with VAT receipts. All in the name of 'efficiency'.
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