[Article]State-owned railway group NS uses Ireland to dodge Dutch taxes

munchkin_utd

it seems that irish rail isnt the only rail company "in" Ireland!!

The state-owned Dutch railway company NS has managed to cut its Dutch tax bill by at least €250m since 1999 by routing the cost of new trains through Ireland, the Volkskrant reported at the weekend.

The tax dodge means the treasury has lost out on income generated by a company it owns, the paper points out. The finance ministry, meanwhile, is said to be ‘unhappy’ about the arrangement, which it has been aware of from the beginning.

In effect, NS’s Irish subsidiary, NS Financial Services, has spent €1.7bn on new trains which it then rents to the NS in the Netherlands. None of the trains has ever been used on the Irish railways, the paper said.

This allows the Dutch operation to avoid tax. In Ireland, railway companies have paid an average 9% tax on their profits in recent years. In the Netherlands, NS would have to pay 25% profit tax on the train rental. Some of the ‘missing’ cash does end up with the treasury in the form of dividends.<snip>

full article : http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2012/09/stateowned_railway_group_ns_us.php

edit, it was also reported by the Irish Times yesterday
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2012/0903/1224323531879.html

L1011

I'd love to see NS try fit a VIRM on an Irish railway (hence the papers comment about them not being used here just being a tad redundant!)

flyingsnail

already a thread on it here http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056695721

Aard

This happens a lot with airlines too right? Planes registered in Ireland, then leased to companies in other countries. The Italian airline that went bust recently did just that iirc.