AIR3200 - Alcoholic Ingredients Relief: Law, policy and application: Records and accounts

Law - The Revenue Traders (Accounts and Records) Regulations 1992 (“RTR”)

Maintenance and preservation of accounts and records

A revenue trader who receives, prepares, maintains or issues an item described in Schedule 1 shall -

  • in the case of a received item, keep and preserve the item;
  • in the case of an issued item, keep and preserve a copy of the item; and
  • in the case of an item that is prepared or maintained and which has not been received or which is not issued, preserve the item - RTR, Regn 3.

(1) A revenue trader shall keep and preserve a record of -

  • the production, buying, selling, importation, exportation, dealing in or handling of any excise goods carried on by him;
  • the goods (whether or not they are excise goods) or services received by him in connection with or to enable him to undertake a transaction or activity described in sub paragraph (a) of this paragraph; and
  • the financing or the facilitation, made or effected by him, of a transaction or activity described in sub paragraph (a) of this paragraph (whether or not that transaction or activity was carried on by him).

(2) The record, required of a revenue trader by paragraph (1) of this Regulation, shall include -

  • in the case of a receipt by him of excise goods, the date of receipt, and the name and address of the supplier of those goods to him;
  • in the case of the disposal by him of excise goods, the name and address, except where disposed of by a retail sale, of the person who acquires them, and the date of that disposal; and
  • in the case of a transaction…
  • the date of receipt and the name and address of the person making or effecting that transaction, where the revenue trader (keeping and preserving a record as required by paragraph (1) of this regulation) is the recipient of that transaction; and
  • the date of making or effecting that transaction and the name and address of the recipient of it, where the revenue trader (keeping and preserving a record as required by paragraph (1 ) of this regulation) is making or effecting that transaction.

(3) The record, required of a revenue trader by paragraph (1) of this regulation, shall contain sufficient information, by way of cross referencing or otherwise, to enable an officer to trace readily any payments, made or received by that trader in respect of any excise goods or of any financing or facilitation described in sub paragraph (c) of paragraph (1) of this regulation - RTR, Regn 4.

A revenue trader shall keep and preserve such records as the Commissioners may specify for any case or cases, in a notice published by them and not withdrawn by a further notice - RTR, Regn 6.

Anything that is required by or under these Regulations to be preserved by a revenue trader shall be preserved for a period of six years, or such lesser period as the Commissioners may allow, starting, on the day that the obligation to preserve arises - RTR, Regn 8.

Policy and application

Claimants must keep and preserve all documents, accounts and records specified in regulation 4, Schedule 1 (see Appendix C) and Notice 41.

This regulation sets a 6 year retention period for records and accounts.

In cases where the retention period of 6 years causes claimants storage problems, involves them in undue expense, etc you may authorise them to retain secondary records for a lesser period.