Qubic Advisory Services Ltd – UT – Gold bullion – Penalty – whether taxpayer had breached invoicing and record keeping requirements

• 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

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