Associated Newspapers Ltd, publisher of the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday newspapers, has won a First Tier Tribunal (FTT) appeal over the VAT treatment of retailer vouchers it distributed as part of marketing and sales promotions, in what was identified as a complex case which is likely to be subject to further legal argument
The tribunal considered the publisher’s claim to recover input tax on the purchase of face-value vouchers provided to its customers as an incentive for purchasing its titles through newsagent daily delivery [Associated Newspapers Ltd and the Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, TC04586 [2015] UKFTT 0409 (TC)].
The FTT had already heard a separate appeal by Associated Newspapers relating to the question of the publisher’s liability to account for output tax on its delivery of the vouchers to its customers. That appeal was allowed [Associated Newspapers Ltd [2014] TC 03256)].
The latest appeal considered three promotions operated by Associated Newspapers. The first involved a basic offer of a 50% reduction on the cover price of the newspaper titles if the customer purchased them through a newsagent daily delivery service for a period of 12 or 13 weeks.
