Vat refund problem.

Tango1947

A few years ago, I purchased some bathroom equipment. As they were for a person with disabilities / chronic illness, they were exempt from vat. Before purchase I filled in a simple declaration form and was sold the goods free of vat.

A couple of months ago, as the items had developed a fault, I ordered a similar item from Amazon. I checked Amazons policy on vat exemption items and it appeared I had to pay full price and then request a vat refund.

Amazons website gave two options. Either send an email together with the declaration form to the provided email address or alternatively send a letter by post to the given customer services address.

Initially I sent an email, but I received a quick response stating that I was not a registered Amazon seller. I wrote back to explain that I am not a seller, but a buyer wanting to claim a refund. However they ignored my email and two subsequent emails.

I therefore decided to write a letter to the address provided. But after a month have received no reply from Amazon customer services.

I'm just wondering now how to progress this in order to get my vat refund, which amounts to around £250.

Any suggestions?

born_again

Tango1947 said:

A few years ago, I purchased some bathroom equipment. As they were for a person with disabilities / chronic illness, they were exempt from vat. Before purchase I filled in a simple declaration form and was sold the goods free of vat.

A couple of months ago, as the items had developed a fault, I ordered a similar item from Amazon. I checked Amazons policy on vat exemption items and it appeared I had to pay full price and then request a vat refund.

Amazons website gave two options. Either send an email together with the declaration form to the provided email address or alternatively send a letter by post to the given customer services address.

Initially I sent an email, but I received a quick response stating that I was not a registered Amazon seller. I wrote back to explain that I am not a seller, but a buyer wanting to claim a refund. However they ignored my email and two subsequent emails.

I therefore decided to write a letter to the address provided. But after a month have received no reply from Amazon customer services.

I'm just wondering now how to progress this in order to get my vat refund, which amounts to around £250.

Any suggestions?

Was it a amazon purchase or a marketplace seller?

Tango1947

Amazon purchase

DullGreyGuy

They arent exempt from VAT, they get VAT relief so VAT is charged at 0%... has the same impact for you but a very different one for the seller. 

First of all, did you buy from Amazon themselves or did you buy from a market place seller? Amazon only deal with VAT refunds when they are the seller, you have to contact the market place seller for anything else. 

Ultimately only the seller can deal with it, there is no way to reclaim the money from HMRC afterwards. 

Assume you sent the letter to:

Amazon UK Services Ltd
1 Principal Place
Worship Street
London
EC2A 2FA
United Kingdom 

Tango1947

Yes, that's the address I used. It was an Amazon purchase. If there's any problem with it, I would have thought they would have the decency to reply. 

DullGreyGuy

Tango1947 said:

Yes, that's the address I used. It was an Amazon purchase. If there's any problem with it, I would have thought they would have the decency to reply. 

It's unfortunate they dont name a department or team on the address. Its probably one of those things the mailroom dont see often, they open, look at the 120 pigeon holes in front of them and take a best guess. In a few days the team who's pigeon hole it is gets round to looking at it, has no idea what its going on about so sticks back into the mail rooms pigeon hole and they make a second guess or the person tries the one they think it was.

When I'm in the office I tend to sit next to CoSec who inevitably get a moderate amount of post still. The other day they found some post in a pigeon hole of a defunct team that was for them but had been going round the building for 2 months based on the various post room stamps. 

Can't do much more than send another letter, "signed for" can sometimes in some companies go down a different path but without an addressee it's still a bit of a punt.