Readers' forum : Point of entry

My UK company is a retailer of items that are standard-rated for UK VAT purposes.The goods are sourced from outside the EU so we are invoiced by non-EU suppliers for the products which they dispatch into our non-EU base. For practical reasons we centralise the goods there. They first enter EU territory when a sale is made to EU/UK businesses.

I understand that purchases of goods (which do not enter the UK) from our non-EU suppliers are outside the scope of UK VAT. Sales of goods located in our non-EU base and sent to EU/UK customers are also outside the scope of UK VAT (given that the sales are not removed from the UK). The EU/UK customer will however incur VAT at the EU/UK point of entry which he may be able to recover.

VATA 1994 s 26(2)(b) states: ‘The amount of input tax for which...