- Qubic Advisory Services Ltd (QASL) purchased gold bullion from Bullion Vault and sold it to customers, receiving reimbursement of the cost of the gold plus a 1% commission.
- A dispute arose over penalties totaling £14,821,380 for failure to comply with record-keeping requirements related to transactions in gold.
- The penalties were issued under s69A of the Finance Act 1999, based on regulations in the VAT Regulations 1995/2518 and Notice 701/21 Gold Imports and Exports. QASL argued that the record-keeping requirements did not apply because the investment gold was never delivered to their customers as required by the Notice.
- HMRC disagreed, and the First-tier Tribunal (FTT) dismissed the taxpayer’s appeal, concluding that the gold bullion was delivered or available to be taken away.
Source KPMG
