x Roasted! Morrisons loses £17m VAT battle over rotisserie chickens
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/16/morrisons-loses-vat-rotisserie-chickens-high-court-tax-rate
Posted by AnOrangeBeanbag
x Roasted! Morrisons loses £17m VAT battle over rotisserie chickens
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/16/morrisons-loses-vat-rotisserie-chickens-high-court-tax-rate
Posted by AnOrangeBeanbag
20 Comments
The only loser out of this is us. the charges are passed onto the consumer making similar products 20% more expensive but the tax collected is wasted on consultation fees spent by the government.
They closed our hot chicken counter years ago. Shame really used to be able to get some marked down stuff for under a quid near closing.
If Greggs doesn’t have to charge VAT on their stuff, I don’t see how whole cooked cool-down chickens aren’t the same thing.
Now I know why Tescos cooked chickens have gone up over £3 last couple years. They are wonderful refried with chips and sweetcorn.
Cool I guess they’ll probably just close their hot food counter like every other supermarket has done around here.
Morrisons was the only place nearby where you can still get rotisserie chicken
Well we had the sausage roll tax. This is basically that ambient food vs hot food stuff all over again isn’t it.
Good. Supermarkets and Greggs have been using this ambient food scam for years and it’s killed off thousands of small independent takeaways which can’t get away with it and had to charge VAT. Should even the playing field a bit in the absence of the government actually doing something to help small hospitality businesses with VAT
Absolute waste of everyone’s time. Every time a case like this goes to court they should just broaden the tax base so that both kinds of chicken are subject to VAT regardless of temperature. Want to argue your pamphlet is a book so it’s not subject to VAT? Fine pamphlets AND books are charged VAT now. Broaden the VAT base and make the system fairer and less complicated.
I used to get mine from M&S but the thing was so buttery I could feel my arteries clogging with every bite.
People having the audacity to shout about how it’s a cost passed to the consumer etc etc when in reality, they don’t have to pass that onto consumers.
There is a strong disparity between the level of anger against the government for taxing something in the correct manner, according to the rules, because of consumer cost and the anger directed at a company for actually making the CHOICE to pass it onto consumers.
I’m not disagreeing that, in some cases, taxation can cause a genuine need to pass down the cost to be consumers and valid frustration at said tax but I can’t understand in a case like this just accepting that Morrisons should/need to pass on the cost.
They were explicitly benefiting from a tax loophole and now it’s rightfully been closed. They had a pre-tax profit of £2.1B built off the back of a cost of living crisis; they can withstand a £17M bill they’ve managed to dodge for a while.
Edit: I am aware that their actual operating margin is in the red and the profits were made from capital sales but:
1. They still have that money regardless.
2. Their operating costs wouldn’t be in the red if it wasn’t for their ludicrous private equity debt financing that cost £700M.
It’s not taxation driving them out of business, it’s their own idiocy.
God dammit. I love a rotisserie chicken now and then. Easy, better for you than a takeout, and not prohibitively expensive.
Tax billionaires FFS and leave my dinner alone.
Even if there weren’t a massive backlog of cases, it is insane that court time is wasted on stuff like this. Stop carving out exemptions for VAT, cut something else in the tax system if you really want to account for it, but stop having smart, well paid people argue about how long after purchase people eat food or whether whatever it is stored in constitures a cabinet or a rack.
I think that the basic point being missed here is that the Government (may they all, of whatever political hue, burn in hell) is adding VAT at 20% to basic foodstuffs. These aren’t chocolates or biscuits or any other “luxury” product. It’s someone’s meal, usually someone poor (who would save money by not having to turn their oven on), or some harassed and busy parent trying to buy something decent and wholesome to eat for their family. Rant over thank you.
I literally lived off of Morrison’s rotisserie chickens at uni
One more example of our insane VAT rules.
Why can’t we just be sensible, apply it to everything with a lower rate.
Morrisons has one of the last decent hot food counters going. Seems like not for much longer
I guess there goes the last of the hot food counters in supermarkets then.
What a waste of money. How much has hmrc paid to lawyers to fight and how much has Morrisons paid? All unproductive money.
Just simplify VAT. Get rid of 0 rated and lower the % so everyone knows what to expect and hmrc can spend its time fighting real cheats.
This is pretty bad… y’know, charging VAT just because something is warm is a crazy thing. Next they will be coming after fresh baked bread. A rotisserie chicken is not a ‘luxury item’ – for many it is a cheap nutritious source of protein on a budget. (and delicious!). It also saves food waste.
Why thank you HMRC for your relentless pursuit of the enshittification of the lives of ordinary people rather than going after major tax avoidance and evasion.