VAT Fact - Liz Taylor Auction

You may have seen the news about the record breaking €115m auction of Elizabeth Taylor’s jewellery in New York last night. So no doubt you’re wondering what the VAT implications are of bring some of these beautiful items back to the UK? So...

Generally you’d expect jewellery to attract 20% import VAT;

But if you snapped up the $11m pear-shaped 16th-century pearl, once owned by England's Mary Tudor, this would qualify as an antique and an reduced effective VAT rate of 5%;

And similarly, if you could successfully argue that the $4.2m tiara (a birthday gift in 1957) is an item of historical significance, the 5% could also apply.