First-tier Tribunal (Tax)

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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> First-tier Tribunal (Tax) >> Winshill Scaffolding Services (UK) Ltd v Revenue & Customs [2009] UKFTT 124 (TC) (09 June 2009)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKFTT/TC/2009/TC00092.html
Cite as: [2009] UKFTT 124 (TC)

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Winshill Scaffolding Services (UK) Ltd v Revenue & Customs [2009] UKFTT 124 (TC) (09 June 2009)
VAT - SECURITY- REQUIREMENT FOR
Vat - security- requirement for

[2009] UKFTT 124 (TC)

TC00092

VAT – security – director's involvement in earlier failed companies – reasonableness of the demand – appeal dismissed

FIRST-TIER TRIBUNAL (TAX CHAMBER)

WINSHILL SCAFFOLDING SERVICES (UK) LTD Appellant

- and -

THE COMMISSIONERS FOR

HER MAJESTY'S REVENUE AND CUSTOMS Respondents

Tribunal: Lady Mitting (Judge)

Mrs. R Dean FCA (Member)

Sitting in public in Manchester on 2 June 2009

The Appellant did not appear and was not represented

Kim Tilling of counsel, instructed by the General Counsel and Solicitor to Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs for the Respondents

© CROWN COPYRIGHT 2009
 


DECISION

1. The Appellant company appeals against a decision of the Commissioners dated 9 July 2008 and being a Notice of Requirement to give Security under schedule 11, paragraph 4(2)(a) Value Added Tax Act 1994. The demand was in the sum of £14,950 if quarterly returns were submitted or £9,950 on monthly returns.
2. When the appeal was called on for hearing there was no attendance on behalf of the Appellant. The company had been informed of the date of the hearing by letter dated 26 January 2009 and again by letter dated 24 March 2009, which altered the time from 10.30am to 2pm. Neither notice had been returned. We therefore decided to hear the case in the absence of the Appellant.
3. Oral evidence was given on behalf of the Commissioners by Mr. Ian Pumfrey. Mr. Pumfrey took us through a chain of companies of which this one appeared to be the latest incarnation. Mr. Nigel Malcolm Bowler, trading as Winshill Scaffolding Services, was registered from 21 September 1994 to 1 June 2005. The Commissioners had written off a debt against this registration of £144,930.80. Winshill Scaffolding Services Ltd were registered from 1 June 2005 (the de-registration date of the sole proprietorship) and de-registered on 16 July 2008. Nigel Malcolm Bowler was a director of this company and Mrs. Georgina Grace Bowler was director and company secretary. The Commissioners had written off a debt of £54,170.32 against this registration. In respect of this company, the Commissioners raised a Notice of Requirement on 17 August 2005. The company's first return had been a repayment return of £18,000, generated in the main by purchases from the sole proprietorship. On the agreement of the Bowlers to have the £18,000 offset against the debt of the sole proprietorship and a promise of better compliance in the future, the Notice of Requirement was withdrawn on 13 January 2006. Compliance deteriorated immediately and the next two returns were not submitted. A further Notice of Requirement was issued on 12 April 2006. The company appealed to the tribunal, did not attend the tribunal and the appeal was dismissed with costs.
4. The Appellant was registered from 1 June 2008, some four weeks before the earlier company went into administration. Mrs. Georgina Grace Bowler is the sole director.
5. There was one further registration relating to Mrs. Bowler from 12 February 2007 to 1 June 2008 and related to a public house. On de-registration, four returns were outstanding and £2,324 was owed to the Commissioners.
6. To Mr. Pumfrey, the Appellant is merely the third incarnation of the same business. Excluding the public house, all three registrations carried out exactly the same trade from the same address. In other words the same business had been run from the same premises since 1994. The total debt to the Commissioners was in the region of £200,000. He therefore decided that to protect the Revenue, a Notice of Requirement had to be issued. The quantum was based on the final four returns of Winshill Scaffolding Services Ltd and proportionately reduced to reflect the projected turnover of the Appellant in the VAT1.
7. Two applications for reconsideration were made. Both were considered by independent officers and in both cases the Notice was upheld.
8. The Appellant's grounds of appeal are that this was a new company; the first return had been put in on time; the company would in future maintain accurate records and complete and pay their returns on time and that strict new cashflow management was in operation.
9. Our jurisdiction is limited to considering the reasonableness of Mr. Pumfrey's decision at the time that it was made. It is our view that the factors which he took into account were all relevant; he took into account nothing that was irrelevant and proper weight was attached to all matters. The amount of the security appears to us to have been reasonably and fairly calculated and in short we find the Requirement as raised to be totally reasonable. The appeal is therefore dismissed.
10. Mrs. Tilling made an application for costs. Given that there was no attendance by or on behalf of Winshill Scaffolding Services Ltd on the hearing of their appeal and no attendance on this appeal either, we grant Mrs. Tilling's application and direct that the Appellant pay the Commissioners' costs in the sum of £500.

MAN/2008/1232

LADY MITTING

JUDGE
Release Date: 9 June 2009