WHA Ltd v HMRC

In WHA Ltd v HMRC (Supreme Court – 1 May) a group of companies instituted a complex scheme which was intended to allow the recovery of input tax charged on repair services made under insurance policies relating to vehicle breakdown (‘MBI policies’). The scheme involved the use of two Gibraltar insurance companies one of which (V) appointed a UK company (W) to handle claims and pay the repair bills. Customs rejected the repayment claims considering firstly that the garages which provided the repair services were making their supplies to the insured customers rather than to W. W and V appealed contending that the garages were supplying their services to W which in turn was making onward supplies to V. The VAT Tribunal rejected this contention and dismissed the appeals (VTD 17605) finding that ‘there was no...