Revenue case involving seized "commercial/private" jeep

cargo

Anyone see anything about this below in the Business Post at the weekend? Just curious as to what exactly happened but I dont have a subscription to the Post.

This is the preview you can see before you need a subscription. Throw the word "Revenue" into the SBP website and it comes up. Cant find it in any other publication.

http://www.businesspost.ie

The Revenue was entitled to confiscate a €55,000 Mercedes which was imported into the Republic as a commercial vehicle and then converted for private use.

Eric Cartman

nothing new here

people were bringing in luxury 4x4s , taking out the back seats, declaring them commercial then putting the seats back in, it was a tax and VRT dodge that had to be solved by changing it to whatever type the vehicle left the factory as.

Whoever converted this back to passenger knew they could be caught, and they were, thats the end of it.

Robbo

The Judgment is here.

End result is, through attempting to confine the 1992 Finance Act to a blinkered view of what is and isn't a car, he now has to pay the VRT and 2 sets of High Court costs.

Like so many with "commercialised" 4x4s, there was a large element of having your cake and eating it.

Paddy001

Basically he imported the car through a crowd in Antrim and paid them €1500 to convert it to a commercial. He paid his €50 VRT and converted it back to a private vehicle at a cost of €2000 within 4 weeks and then taxed it as private. He understood it was legitimate to return it to private use once it was off road, however it was not and he did not inform Revenue. Solicitor tried to claim it was designed and built for off road however the court said it was used two thirds of the time on public roads and had unsuitable tyres for off road. Judge accepted it could be used off road but he could not have it both ways so the judge ordered the car to be forfeited. It happened at a revenue checkpoint when they checked the reg and it came up as commercial and they went from there. The person named is Tom Murray T/A Tom Murray Garden Machinery of Co. Wexford and the dealer involved was MC Import Export Services in Crumlin, Co. Antrim.

cargo

Eric Cartman wrote: »

nothing new here

people were bringing in luxury 4x4s , taking out the back seats, declaring them commercial then putting the seats back in, it was a tax and VRT dodge that had to be solved by changing it to whatever type the vehicle left the factory as.

Whoever converted this back to passenger knew they could be caught, and they were, thats the end of it.

Yeah I know the scam etc. I was more interested as to what grounds someone would try challenge the Revenue for "unlawful detention" of the vehicle.

Robbo's article below explains the law end thats what I was after.

cargo

Robbo wrote: »

The Judgment is here.

End result is, through attempting to confine the 1992 Finance Act to a blinkered view of what is and isn't a car, he now has to pay the VRT and 2 sets of High Court costs.

Like so many with "commercialised" 4x4s, there was a large element of having your cake and eating it.

Cheers' thanks.

cargo

Paddy001 wrote: »

Basically he imported the car through a crowd in Antrim and paid them €1500 to convert it to a commercial. He paid his €50 VRT and converted it back to a private vehicle at a cost of €2000 within 4 weeks and then taxed it as private. He understood it was legitimate to return it to private use once it was off road, however it was not and he did not inform Revenue. Solicitor tried to claim it was designed and built for off road however the court said it was used two thirds of the time on public roads and had unsuitable tyres for off road. Judge accepted it could be used off road but he could not have it both ways so the judge ordered the car to be forfeited. It happened at a revenue checkpoint when they checked the reg and it came up as commercial and they went from there. The person named is Tom Murray T/A Tom Murray Garden Machinery of Co. Wexford and the dealer involved was MC Import Export Services in Crumlin, Co. Antrim.

I dont think he ever taxed it as Private. I think from the law case it was still on commercial tax. Because if he officially changed it back to Private then he would have been liable for the VRT at that point. It would have been a 7 seater driving around with a €200 tax disk (or whatever the commercial rate is.)

Bearcat

He screwed the pooch.....end of.

Anan1

cargo wrote: »

I dont think he ever taxed it as Private.

It says in the judgement linked by Robbo that he did.

Eric Cartman

will he have to pay VRT at its current rate or at the original rate when the vehicle was imported ?

I suppose it was a worthwhile gamble in his mind as its a vehicle that had ~24k VRT

'tis mind boggling how solicitors work "..........informed by Mr. Keller, solicitor that the vehicle was not liable for vehicle registration tax as it did not come within the definition of a vehicle under the 1992 Finance Act.

22. On 20th April, 2009, M.W. Keller & Son, solicitors wrote to the defendants alleging the vehicle had been improperly seized. The grounds relied on were, the vehicle was designed and constructed for off road use and in accordance with s. 130 of the Finance Act 1992, at the time of its conversion from commercial to passenger use was not subject to vehicle registration tax."

Anan1

RoverJames wrote: »

'tis mind boggling how solicitors work "..........informed by Mr. Keller, solicitor that the vehicle was not liable for vehicle registration tax as it did not come within the definition of a vehicle under the 1992 Finance Act.

22. On 20th April, 2009, M.W. Keller & Son, solicitors wrote to the defendants alleging the vehicle had been improperly seized. The grounds relied on were, the vehicle was designed and constructed for off road use and in accordance with s. 130 of the Finance Act 1992, at the time of its conversion from commercial to passenger use was not subject to vehicle registration tax."

It really is giving two fingers to the people of this country - i'm delighted that Tom Murray now has to pay both sets of court costs and the VRT.

Big Nasty

If I bought a new hiace van and months / years later decided to change it to passenger would I have to pay VRT on it?

Bandara

Excellent news

If your going roll the dice don't complain when it comes up odd

Anan1

MCMLXXV wrote: »

If I bought a new hiace van and months / years later decided to change it to passenger would I have to pay VRT on it?

Of course you would.

Big Nasty

Anan1 wrote: »

Of course you would.

I suppose!

Anan1

MCMLXXV wrote: »

I suppose!

Sure otherwise everyone would be buying carvans and fitting rear seats afterwards.:)

Big Nasty

Anan1 wrote: »

Sure otherwise everyone would be buying carvans and fitting rear seats afterwards.:)

I know yeah - not one of my best thought out posts! :cool:

ZENER

Off on a very slight tangent on this topic, would you report someone who was blatantly abusing the VRT and Road Tax process ? For example if you knew someone doing what the OP posted or who had a UK Reg car for over 6 months with every intention of avoiding VRT and Road Tax for as a long as possible would you squeal ?!

Ken

AltAccount

Depends whether I liked them or not...

pH

Can anyone clarify if as long as you leave the back seats out you can privately own a commercial SUV and tax it as such? Is it just reconverting back to a 5/7 seater the revenue go for - as I know a couple of people who have "commercial" SUVs (2 seats) and have no problem taxing/insuring them - or are these people also looking at court appearances/fines/confiscation?

cargo

Anan1 wrote: »

Sure otherwise everyone would be buying carvans and fitting rear seats afterwards.:)

jaysus spent nearly 5 minutes trying to figure out what you were trying to infer there because every time I read it I kept seeing carAvans!!!!!

cargo

Anan1 wrote: »

It says in the judgement linked by Robbo that he did.

Yeah sorry when I re-read it I spotted that.

How does that work? When it's imported it would receive a logbook that states it's a commercial. How can it be taxed as private without the logbook been changed to reflect that it's no longer a commercial vehicle? Or is it a bit of a loophole that you can decide to use a commercial vehicle for private purposes and the tax office are happy to accept your decision to pay higher road tax on your commercial vehicle?

If that's the case you can see why you would chance it. You would be unlikely to be caught on the road as you'd have a passenger/private vehicle with a "proper" passenger/private tax disk.

I dont think Cartell shows up the registered class of vehicle either (free report) so the neighbors cant easily check.

Edit:
I wrote that on the back of checking a transit which just came back as a CONNECT L200 TD SWB 05DR but then I checked a commercial small SUV jeep I know and it came up as a 2.0 EX 4X2 COMMERCIAL. I dont know any more reg numbers to check further.