Vintro Pro
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Vintro Pro
NL · FR · EN
In the UK refurbishing only touches your bookkeeping. In Belgium and France the word is “renovated”, and it looks suspiciously like what the market calls refurbished.
Second-hand electronics fall under the margin, until you renew them thoroughly.
Second-hand electronics fall under the margin scheme. The UK has no renovated-goods exclusion, but Belgium and France do — and that is exactly the question with refurbished devices.
A used device that still works is tangible movable property that can be used again. For ordinary resale that settles it.
What sets this trade apart is that something usually happens to the device before it is sold on. The UK rule keeps that work out of the margin; Belgium and France can put the whole device outside the scheme.
Article 2 of the Value Added Tax (Special Provisions) Order 1995 itself speaks of goods suitable for further use “as it is or after repair”. Replacing a failed power supply or fixing a screen therefore does not take a device out of the scheme.
Buy from private individuals, from a business disposal without VAT or from a colleague working under the margin, and there is nothing to deduct. That is exactly what the scheme is for.
Article 2 of the Value Added Tax (Special Provisions) Order 1995 defines second-hand goods as “tangible movable property that is suitable for further use as it is or after repair, other than motor cars, works of art, collectors’ items or antiques and other than precious metals and precious stones”. Article 12(2) opens the margin scheme to “works of art, antiques and collectors’ items” and “second-hand goods”.
That is the whole test, and it is a test about the goods, not about your trade. The power to charge VAT on the profit margin sits in section 50A of the VAT Act 1994, which also names motor vehicles separately. Article 12(3) of the 1995 Order adds the purchase side: you must have taken possession of the goods on a supply on which no VAT was chargeable, or on another margin-scheme sale. gov.uk (VAT margin schemes) puts it plainly: you cannot use a margin scheme for “any item you bought for which you were charged VAT”. Belgium, which follows the EU VAT Directive, keeps its own exclusion list: FPS Finance names new goods, precious metals, precious stones and pearls, renovated goods, goods consumed on first use and goods that cannot be used again in the same state, under article 58, § 4 of the Belgian VAT Code and Royal Decree no. 53 of 23 December 1994. The four-country panel below shows where that changes the answer.
The example is a used amplifier: bought for €90.00, sold for €260.00. Put your own figures in.
Sold at a loss: no margin on this item, so no VAT. In the UK you work item by item: the loss counts as zero and gives you nothing back.
The VAT is inside the margin, not on top of it. That is the mistake this calculator is built to prevent: 20% on this example’s margin of 170 is 34.00, while in the UK you owe one-sixth, 28.33 — the 16.67% gov.uk quotes. At Belgium’s 21%, the same mistake turns €29.50 into €35.70. How to do this across a whole return period — and why France calculates piece by piece by law — is set out in How do you calculate margin VAT?
In the UK the 1995 Order has no separate exclusion for renovated goods. What it does is keep the work out of the margin: gov.uk (VAT margin schemes) says you cannot include repairs, parts or accessories in the calculation, and you reclaim the VAT on them in the normal way. In Belgium renovated goods are excluded outright, and in France a device whose added parts are worth more than the used device plus the cost of the work becomes a new product.
Devices broken up for parts can stay in the UK scheme: HMRC lets you sell the parts under global accounting if each was worth less than £500 (VATMARG03300), but not once they are recycled into raw material. New devices from end-of-line stock come with VAT on the invoice, and gov.uk excludes any item you bought for which you were charged VAT, even if the model is discontinued.
In the UK, gov.uk excludes any item you bought for which you were charged VAT; it does not list new goods as such. In France, goods bought from a private individual fall under the margin even if never used (rescrit BOI-RES-TVA-000270, 19 August 2026). Only Belgium’s FPS Finance names new goods as excluded. End-of-line stock bought from a business that charges you VAT falls outside the scheme in all four countries — because of that VAT, not because it is new.
In the UK, whether electronics fall under the scheme is a matter of UK law: HMRC runs its own margin schemes under section 50A of the VAT Act 1994. Belgium, the Netherlands and France all follow the same EU VAT Directive (2006/112/EC). Each country interprets the rules itself; where that makes a difference for electronics, this page says so. The rate and the calculation method always differ.
Margin across the whole return period. Article 58, § 4 VAT Code and RD no. 53.
Per period by default (global accounting, Uitvoeringsbesluit OB 1968, art. 4c(1)). You can opt out in writing to the inspector, for at least five years.
Legally piece by piece, but globalisation per period is allowed, with no prior election. CGI art. 297 A; BOFiP § 260.
HMRC’s own scheme, outside the EU. Below the registration threshold you pay nothing.
In the UK the rebuild costs never enter the margin, and in Belgium and France a renovated device leaves the scheme altogether. The further you go, the weaker your position in an audit there.
In the UK that works under global accounting if each part’s purchase value stays under £500 (VATMARG03300). In Belgium goods out of use are on the exclusion list.
The margin is selling price minus purchase price. Parts and hours lower your profit, not your margin.
If your supplier charged you VAT, the device is not margin goods, whether or not you deducted it. That choice is made at purchase.
This is an explanation, not tax advice. Whether the margin scheme is the right choice in your case, and how to enter it in your return, is a question for your accountant.
Yes. Article 2 of the Value Added Tax (Special Provisions) Order 1995 defines second-hand goods as tangible movable property that is suitable for further use as it is or after repair. A working second-hand device fits that, and article 12(2) opens the margin scheme to it. Belgium uses the same definition (article 58, § 4 of its VAT Code and Royal Decree no. 53).
Yes: the word sits in the definition of second-hand goods itself. In the UK the repair costs stay out of the margin calculation (gov.uk). In Belgium renovated goods are on the exclusion list, and in France a renovated device becomes a new product taxed on its full price.
In the UK the 1995 Order has no renovation test: a refurbished device bought without VAT stays eligible, and the refurbishing costs stay out of the margin. In Belgium and France it depends on how far you go, not on the word on the box; France even puts a figure on it. Put your own method to your accountant.
In the UK, at 20%, the VAT is one-sixth of the margin: €170 ÷ 6 = €28.33 (in pounds the sum works the same way). In Belgium, at 21%, €29.50 (€170 × 21/121).
The same question, a different kind of piece. The answer differs more often than you would expect.
Every piece gets its own purchase price, selling price and scheme. Vintro Pro keeps margin goods separate from the rest and works out your margin per return period.
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