Distance Selling & EU Tax law affecting whisky

[Nick Brown]

Evenv better would be the idea of volunteer UK HMRC officers (me, me, me - pleaseeeee) travelling around Europe visiting shops that mail order whisky to UK customers. What a job. Every day a different city in a different country, sharing a different dram with thev shop owner.

Are HMRC officers allowed to accept hospitality from their clients?

[C57]

Evenv better would be the idea of volunteer UK HMRC officers (me, me, me - pleaseeeee) travelling around Europe visiting shops that mail order whisky to UK customers. What a job. Every day a different city in a different country, sharing a different dram with thev shop owner.

Are HMRC officers allowed to accept hospitality from their clients?

Probably not, now.
I've just finished re-reading Wort, Worms & Washbacks - clearly it was acceptable in the past!

[Exciseman]

Going back into the mists of time (aka the good old days), it was fine for the local Distillery Officer to partake of the odd 'dram or ten'.

Things are different now. Accepting a nice working lunch during a day-long visit to a large company is still fine. But I guess not alcohol.

[EuroAccises]

Hello

I'm planning to help Internet seller to import Champagne from France to UK. The transportation is arranged by the seller. I should personally contact a REDS agent and deal with them in order to proceed with the matter. Unfortunately, some of them are simply not interested.
Could anyone be of help on this forum.
Thanks.

EuroAccises

[anneb]

Hello all, I am a newbie -
sorry to take up the distance selling & eu tax law conversation again, but having read all your posts (most informative) do I understand that to stay on the right side of the rules and regulations, I better not start selling my whisky on-line from uk towards eu unless I have unlimited amount of time to devote to burocracy in each country -
Have any of you used duty rep and vat rep ? if so any advice

[anneb]

Hello

I'm planning to help Internet seller to import Champagne from France to UK. The transportation is arranged by the seller. I should personally contact a REDS agent and deal with them in order to proceed with the matter. Unfortunately, some of them are simply not interested.
Could anyone be of help on this forum.
Thanks.

EuroAccises

I import wine from france on a small scale (10/12 pallets a year) for our hotel and I use a company that does door to door service for me (collection,REDS, paperwork, delivery) of course it cost a bit but not so much that we can't work decent margins - company is called procurus

[EuroAccises]

Hello

Thanks for reply

for selling whisky from UK to EU

I have contact with customs authority France, germany, Belgium and Luxembourg

Best regards

[Malt-Teaser]

Hello all, I am a newbie -
sorry to take up the distance selling & eu tax law conversation again, but having read all your posts (most informative) do I understand that to stay on the right side of the rules and regulations, I better not start selling my whisky on-line from uk towards eu unless I have unlimited amount of time to devote to burocracy in each country -
Have any of you used duty rep and vat rep ? if so any advice

AnneB,
as has been reported here, if you sell any alcohol from the UK to any other EU country you need to find a way to pay Duty at the correct rate of the destination country and then claim your UK Duty back from the UK. Before you post the goods!
You MUST also remove the UK Duty stamp from any bottle posted to other EU countries and if you post to a country using their own stamp, you MUST affix their stamp, for example those tax strips across bottle tops for Italy. (Also Spain, Portugal and maybe more).

Basically, this means a website must have up to 27 different prices for each item as all Duty rates are different.
If you exceed any VAT allowances in any country, you also need to pay VAT there.

Regards,
Malty


Edit: This whole issue seems to be getting really hot now as my local British shop will no longer stock UK ciders & beers. He had two UK suppliers, one no longer lists any alcohol due to this 'problem' and the other has just increased prices stupidly, obviously wishing to discourage business that way.

[anneb]

Euroaccises : I had a look at your website and I presume that you could help with duty payment , but what about vat ? also, if one is starting small, are the fees quite prohibitive ?

Malty : hot topic indeed ! just disheartening really - Not that selling to the uk and rest of the world is too small a market, but at present most of my requests are from the continent -

Incidentally, I spoke to a very nice chap at TMF today re helping with VAT payments in member states ... erm... just can't even consider using the service : €1400 one off fee to register per eu country and €400/month to fill in the returns ... I have a feeling that i am too little .

[EuroAccises]

Hello Anneb

1400 € for register VAT it is too expensive c'est fou

For Vat you can contact direcly the VAT authority

example UK to Germany

Finanzamt Hannover-Nord
Vahrenwalder Str. 206
30165 Hannover

UK to France

Service des Impôts des Entreprises
10, rue du Centre
TSA 20011
93465 Noisy-Le-Grand cedex

and..................

and now Excise you need Reads

[Mr Tattie Heid]

I still can't believe that there isn't an enterprising entity out there that can develop and market software that will make all of this a routine matter for EU retailers.

[Peat Sampras]

I still can't believe that there isn't an enterprising entity out there that can develop and market software that will make all of this a routine matter for EU retailers.

It seems to be the goal of the EU to keep things complicated as this gives good work to the overdimensioned waterhead called EU-Administration in Bruxelles... If stuff was simplified a lot of good paid functionaires would lose there jobs. One reason why Switzerland has not joined the EU. Still, if we want to stay competitive, we've got to adopt most of their laws anyway...

[Mr Tattie Heid]

I thought Switzerland was a whole country of functionaries.... Come to think of it, maybe they won't let you join, since you'd obviously get things sorted out straight away.

[Peat Sampras]

I thought Switzerland was a whole country of functionaries.... Come to think of it, maybe they won't let you join, since you'd obviously get things sorted out straight away.

There's surely a bit of truth in both of your arguments