Businesses in Britain charge VAT

[tIIsuggas]

Just out of curiosity, I went through some of the subscription process for one of the paysites.

Bearing in mind, all I am contributing to is upkeep of the site.

I got to this page.



Notice the VAT charge (I am British so have to pay VAT to businesses)

I looked up the VAT rates on the official Customs and Excise site.

Official Site

Does anyone notice any discrepancies between the official VAT rates, and the VAT rate the site is using?

[Pescado]

Yeah, it looks a lot like someone is pocketing abut 7.5% extra as profits. Also, the people in question seem to be Swedish, so they might be keeping all of it. Do non-British people pay that?

[Sherry]

Out of curiousity is that VAT the same for all your paypal purchases or is this a cost that TSR is adding themselves?

[tIIsuggas]

Out of curiousity is that VAT the same for all your paypal purchases or is this a cost that TSR is adding themselves?

I wouldn't know, I don't usually go through PayPal.

The incidence in this matter is through debit card.

[Captain Feathersword]

TSR are based in Sweden, it says so on the form so we have to pay Swedish VAT rates. (I'm not sure whether non-Swedish residents or non-EU residents have to pay it.) VAT is a European tax, but I think it's left up to the countries in charge to set it. As far as I am aware 25% is quite common on the continent. The 17.5% is specific to UK.
Not that this excuses them at all. They are very obviously running a business which is even properly registered. The only problem is what are they actually selling?

[Quorneater]

In England, if you are selling to end-users, people who will be required to pay VAT, then you *must* put the VAT-inclusive price on show.  If you want to show both prices, the VAT-inclusive one must be the larger.   You may show the non-VAT price alone only if you are primarily marketing to business.

[tIIsuggas]

For my subscription I would receive.

Access to certain Sim related downloads that non-subscribers don't have.

Use of the download and install wizard and download basket.  (Sim related again).

Advert free browsing of the site.

Unlimited bandwidth.

*These are from memory, so I may have missed something.

[Captain Feathersword]

For my subscription I would receive.

Access to certain Sim related downloads that non-subscribers don't have.

Use of the download and install wizard and download basket.  (Sim related again).

Advert free browsing of the site.

Unlimited bandwidth.

*These are from memory, so I may have missed something.

Good point. As I do not consider those things worth paying for I have never given it much thought in all the time I have spent there.

[Privateer]

I hate VAT and the Euro too.
Burninate, with extreme prejudice!

[Anouk]

VAT for foodproducts is 6% and for other services is 19% I think. In Holland.

[Captain Feathersword]

VAT
Sweden’s Value Added Tax (VAT) Act is harmonized with the EC VAT directives. Known in Swedish as ”moms”
(short for mervärdesskatt), the normal VAT rate is 25 percent. However, a reduced rate of 12 percent
applies to for example food and hotel charges. A rate of 6 percent applies to personal transportation,
newspapers, books and magazines, entrance fees to commercial sport activities and cultural events.
Certain services are exempt from VAT, including medical and dental care, social services, banking and
financial services etc.
This fact sheet is developed in cooperation with the Swedish government agency, Invest in Sweden Agency, ISA
,www.isa.se, responsible to the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

[jesserocket]

Yeah, 25% is the highest level of VAT the EU allows, in Britain it's 17.5%, but as was said, Sweden has it set at 25%, cos Sweden is ludicrous with the taxes...

[PirateBooty]

But they're not paying taxes, are they? So yeah, extra profit for them.

[Sherry]

Ohh I dunno about TSR.  I would tend to think, yes they may be a site that does pay taxes.  I have heard tell Steve ect. makes a pretty big profit, even with the distribution of money to FA's ect, I think this sort of profit would be pretty hard to hide, unlike some smaller, albeit equally expensive and lesser know paysites.

I mean if you are making $500-$1000 a month, well that is some substantial pocket change, but I also think that is something that online ect you could still hide easily.  From what I have heard, and this was back awhile ago, that TSR makes much more, it might be harder for them to avoid the tax process.  Especially if they know the consquences for hiding larger sums of money.

Edit: plus the sheer fact of it is they are dealing with much larger sums of money too, even if (which I doubt) they aren't making the numbers I was told.  Anyway, I think they are wise enough to know that someone would notice that kind of exchange and they probably do account for it.

[jesserocket]

In this case, I tend to think that they are on the right side of it, and likely are legitimately claiming VAT, however I was looking round, quite a lot, and can't find them saying anything about being VAT registered or being a registered company or anything.

I checked with my boyfriend, who knows about these things, he said this: In the UK, you have to automatically register for VAT if you have a turnover of over £80,000 a year, although it can be voluntary before that, but generally it's not a great idea to do so before then. The reason their VAT number is not publically available is because it's highly unlikely someone would subscribe to them, then write it off a a business expense, but if one was to ask them for it, they would have to give it out, legally.