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Amending a VAT repayment claim to include later claims relating to different transactions

In January 2007 Vodafone claimed a VAT repayment of £4m. It represented the amount by which it had over-declared its liability for output tax under the Nectar card scheme in its VAT returns for the periods 01/04 to 01/06.

HMRC rejected the claim. Vodafone made further claims unrelated to the Nectar scheme but some were for accounting errors in the same accounting periods.

HMRC accepted the later claims but refused to repay some of them on the ground that they had been made out of time.

Vodafone said it was permissible to amend the Nectar claim which had been made in time to encompass the later ones.

The First-tier Tribunal allowed Vodafone’s appeal on the basis that it was implicit in VATA 1994 s 80 that the reasons for the amount being claimed...