VATPOSS07700 - Land-related services: Examples where land is incidental

Examples include

• the legal administration of a deceased person’s estate, which may include property.

  An example of such a situation concerned a London solicitor who was appointed to administer a deceased person’s estate. The deceased lived in Australia and the executors were also located there. The estate included a house in Scotland. A different solicitor in Edinburgh was appointed to deal with the conveyancing. The service of the London solicitor to the executors in administering the estate was not related to land, and was supplied where the recipient belongs, outside the EC. The separate service of the Edinburgh solicitor in conveyancing the house is supplied in the UK, since it is related to land. This differs from the Tribunal decision in Daunter because here the land element was incidental (see VATPOSS07500).

• advice or information relating to land or property markets
• insurance of property
• the hiring out of civil engineering plant on its own
• feasibility studies assessing the potential of particular businesses or business potential in a particular geographic area
• design of a corporate style for an hotel chain
• services of an accountant in simply calculating a tax return from figures provided by a client when those figures relate to rental income
• provision of a recording studio where technicians are included as part of the supply. These are engineering services
• repair and maintenance of free-standing machinery