This is a new one on me.
Long story but I managed to shatter one of the rear windows of the van on Monday.
I've got the van insured on a commercial vehicle policy with RSA. I am not VAT registered
Today Autoglass showed up to replace it. The guy did an excellent job but advised me that he would have to charge me the VAT on the whole invoice and the £50 excess. I was advised that I would have to claim the VAT back from the insurers.
Apparently this is now the way that RSA deal with their winscreen and glass claims on commercial policies, as a lot of VAT registered people with these policies have not been charged VAT, and the insurers have had to foot the VAT bill when they didn't need to.
Hence I have had to send the invoice off to the insurers to claim it back. It seems a lot of trouble for everyone to go to for £33.
H
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I imagine it's because the contract is between yourself and your insurer. Autoglass are merely a sub-contractor to your insurer.
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L\'escargot.
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The repairer has to charge VAT on the full value of the service provided. As the owners of commercial vehicles are normally VAT registered (although not in your case), they can recover the VAT as input tax in the same way as if the insurer was not involved. VAT is therefore not a cost to the owner. No cost to the owner therefore no cost to the insurer.
So 95% of the time the repairer receives the net cost from the insurer and the VAT element from the owner and everyone's happy.
It only becomes complicated when the owner is not VAT registered and has to claim the VAT cost as a reimbursement from the insurer. As the consumer, the insurer can't recover the VAT and nor can you.
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I do understand both points made above, although to be fair I suspect that the percentage of non VAT registered tradesmen/builders with these policies is somewhat greater than 5%.
I understand the fundimentals of how VAT works, but up to now when dealing with a claim (even one on this policy) the insurers have paid the VAT element directly to the repairers.
I agree Autoglass are only doing what they're told by the insurers, so to be fair to them I cannot have an issue with them at all.
My main reason for posting this is that there are others out there in the same position. Fortunately I had the means to meet the extra cost whilst I wait for a refund. However some people in my position may have met the guy with the £50 in his pocket, then have to stump up an extra £30 which he/she doesn't have with him/her.
The insurers really should IMO inform their poliy holders about this method. In my case the policy booklet glibly states that I have a £50 excess to pay. There is no mention about VAT whatsoever.
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Today I contacted the insurers' customer services department and firmly stated that, whilst I could see why they adopted the policy of asking commercial vehicle policy holders to pay the VAT then claim it back, they should make it clear from the outset.
To their credit, they took my points on board. The lady I spoke to accepted the VAT figure I quoted in good faith and has agreed to raise a cheque for this plus an hour of my time in resolving the problem. It took me far longer to do the phone number trail through various departments to claim back the VAT than it did to organise the replacement window.
In addition I stated that there must be a larger number of non VAT registered tradesmen on their policies than they may think. The lady told me that it is assumed that the vast majority of one man businesses of this type are VAT registered. All the ones I know are not.
So, a satisfactory outcome.
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