Carlsberg UK Limited (1) Inbev UK Limited (2) v Commissioners for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs
Decision date: 17 December 2009
Neutral citation: [2009] UKFTT 375 (TC)
Overall AI summary confidence: high
Short overview
This short overview is intended to summarise the case, issues and outcome so far as they are supported by the judgment.
AI confidence in this short overview: high
This appeal concerned whether beer duty must be calculated on each container (e.g. per can) and, if so, whether s.137(4) CEMA permits ignoring fractions of a penny at that container level. The tribunal held that regulation 17 supplies a method to ascertain volume in containers but does not require duty to be calculated per container, and that truncation under s.137(4) applies at the time the duty is payable (the duty point), so the per-container truncation argument was unnecessary and rejected.
Ratio decidendi
This summary is intended to identify the ratio decidendi, meaning the legal reasons for deciding and the binding part of the decision.
AI confidence in this ratio decidendi summary: high
Regulation 17 is a rule for ascertaining volume in containers but is not a comprehensive rule converting the container into the unit on which duty must be calculated; duty is assessed by reference to the total at the relevant duty point. The reference to amounts "due" in s.137(4) should be read as relating to when payment is required, so any disregarding of fractions of a penny occurs at the time the amount is payable (the duty point), not at individual container level.
Obiter dicta
This summary is intended to identify obiter dicta, meaning observations made by the way that were not necessary to deciding the case and are not binding.
AI confidence in this obiter dicta summary: medium
The tribunal noted that ECJ case law on VAT rounding did not assist construction of ALDA and the Beer Regulations in this context, and observed that the appellants' per-container approach would produce anomalous results (duty varying with container size), which supported the tribunal's construction; these comments are non-binding observations.
Warning
- The chunk contains extensive repetition of provisions and submissions; some passages are duplicated and can be noisy to follow. The provided notes contain some repetition and duplicated passages; they may be noisy but appear sufficient for the conclusions summarized.