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Originally Posted by Tim M
I bow to your clearly superior knowledge of this subject. But....regarding your point about Jersey........this is what most sensible owners of larger vessels do, not just Jersey but many other foreign jurisdictions (Red ensign group etc) - transfer the ownership of the vessel into a corporate structure (along with registration) in a more efficient and advantageous jurisdiction. You could easily do this in Jersey as a UK resident, or as per my example, Delaware (probably not worth the cost and hassle for a 1996 RIB!).
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I honestly didn’t mean to come across in that way and I’m sorry if I did.
In regards to your point about registering the boat offshore, I think that you are conflating two different issues. I’ll prefix this by saying this really isn’t my specialist subject, so it’s only my layman’s understanding of corporate yacht ownership...
An owner might register a ship offshore for lots of different reasons - taxation, privacy, liability etc. Caymans, Marshall Islands, Jersey, wherever takes your fancy.
However, your original point which I disagreed with was:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim M
Of course, another option if you wanted to defer the payment (which is quite common particularly on larger boats) would be to have the boat registered somewhere other than the UK ...and then bring the boat into the UK as a visiting foreign flagged vessel - this gives you 18 months of VAT free time in the UK before the boat needs to leave the VAT area - note there's no time limit on how long it needs to be out before it can return and the clock starts again on the VAT clock.
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If you are a
UK resident, and you own a yacht which you want to bring to UK waters, you have to pay the VAT. There is no way around this other than to become a non UK resident.
You can flag it on the Moon if you like, but you’ve still got to pay the VAT if it comes to the UK.
If you are a UK resident, you could register the boat in Jersey, and take it to say France, and as long as you never bring it back to the UK, you could avoid paying the VAT as you say.
But registering the boat offshore won’t help the original poster avoid paying the VAT if he wants to use the boat in the UK, and that’s the bit I disagreed with.
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As per my final point - I wasn't suggesting he break the law - exactly what I suggested, he takes his chances (worst case he has to pay the VAT). I would imagine bringing a UK registered vessel (of the type he's talking about) across would attract minimal interest from HMRC. It isn't a requirement to have any proof of ownership or purchase paperwork to register a boat on the SSR so he would't be breaking any rules there.
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Again I don’t think acting ignorant will particularly help if HMRC catch up with you. The rule he would be breaking would be failing to declare goods he has imported into the UK - aka smuggling. Doesn’t matter if it’s a boat or a pallet of mobile phones
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