Business Diary: April 2

Maybe the region’s PR folk are all too busy freezing to death in the coldest March for more than 50 years, but a little bit more effort would be nice next year.

However one press release came in that tickled Diary.

Perhaps the name of the email’s sender – Paul Bearer – should have offered some clues.

The tale concerns waste and recycling company Businesswaste.co.uk offering bereaved families cheaper, happier funerals that promise to put the fun back into funerals with major discounts for ‘burial parties’.

The company claims that with the price of funerals going through the roof, it can offer deals that undercut most undertakers and council-owned crematoriums, whilst also bringing bereaved families together.

Offering seriously large discounts for its ‘burial parties’, relatives are encouraged to celebrate the lives of their loved ones, leaving the “acknowledged experts in waste and recycling” to make the arrangements.

Fully licensed to handle all kinds of materials, a spokesman for Businesswaste.co.uk said that moving into funerals was a logical step in the company’s business plan.

“Families and councils are cutting costs left, right and centre, and none more so than in the business of saying goodbye to your dearly beloved,” said Businesswaste.co.uk spokesman ‘Paul Bearer’.

“We’ve got the expertise, the contacts, and the full set of EU-recognised certificates that mean we are 100 per cent able to conduct funerals at a substantial saving.”

Businesswaste.co.uk said its Funeral Party division can offer cheap rates on fully-recyclable coffins, ‘real-look’ suits for the deceased and a bin lorry hearse plus a driver who has a full PSV licence.

It goes on to offer a rent-a-priest who doubles up as DJ at the wake and of course, safe, legal recycling of the deceased as per EU Waste Management Regulations (Directives 1999/31/EC and 2000/76/EC of the European Parliament).

New to the funerals business, Businesswaste.co.uk said it can offer a number of alternatives to a boring old hearse from traditional skip trucks to its top-of-the-range bin lorries. Maybe Diary is not the only one to indulge in imagining the mother-in-law’s funeral cortege being led by a top-of-the-range bin lorry...

As to the recyclable part, Diary hopes that doesn’t mean she may come back.

VAT’s not so simple

THE VAT system turned 40 yesterday – perhaps someone with a sense of humour back in 1973 thought it would be funny to launch it on April Fool’s Day.

In contrast to the ‘simple tax’ described by Sir Anthony Barber, the Chancellor in 1973, VAT has developed more plot twists than the equally venerable James Bond franchise.

In 2001 judge Lord Justice Sedley, said: “Beyond the everyday world... lies the world of VAT; a kind of fiscal theme park in which factual and legal realities are suspended or inverted.”

There certainly are some anomalies.

Buy a book that’s printed on paper and it’s VAT free, but an electronic e-book gets the 20 per cent VAT charge whacked on.

Everyday technology that we use today such as tablet computers, e-readers, even faxes, obviously weren’t available in 1973.

In 2015, new legislation will be introduced to account for VAT on electronically supplied services to consumers.

Back in 1973 chocolates, crisps, soft drinks, petrol and diesel bought at the pumps and all takeaway food were VAT free – unlike today.

There are some other strange twists – fruit for cooking such as pureed apple is zero-rated, but if consumed as a smoothie it gets VAT added.

Meanwhile flapjacks are zero-rated and cereal bars are standard-rated, Baked Alaska is zero-rated while ice-cream is standard-rated and if you’re in the market for a coffin it’s standard-rated, but hiring a hearse is VAT free.

Lyndon Firth at KPMG’s Leeds indirect tax team says: “Just as our current working week bears little resemblance to the three-day working week introduced by the British Government in 1973, VAT today bears little resemblance to the simple tax that was introduced 40 years ago.”

He believes that VAT is likely to increase as the Government searches for predictable real-time revenues.

“In times of economic uncertainty taxes on consumption may be more attractive than taxes on profits,” he points out.

Happy Birthday VAT.