US sales tax - record in UK accounts

Hello, I recently incurred expenses while travelling for business in the US. Many of the expenses contain NYC sales tax = our equivalent of VAT. How would I account for this in my accounts? Can I claim this sales tax back? Thank you for your help, Ute

Hi,

These costs incurred would be outside the scope of VAT and so would not need to appear on a VAT return.

You would need to speak to the US authorities to see if you are able to claim back their sales tax.

Thank you.
 

You can only ever reclaim UK VAT on a UK VAT return, so whether it is NYC sales tax or Spanish VAT charged by a Spanish hotel, you cannot reclaim these on the UK VAT return, record them as gross amounts in Box 7. You may be able to reclaim EU VAT back by submitting a claim directly to the EU tax authority (in my Spanish hotel example you would submit a claim to the Spanish tax office under what are called 13th Directive regulation https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/vat-refunds_en As HMRC have posted, you will need to contact the USA tax authority to see what rules are in play for reclaiming sales taxes, not all sales taxes are recoverable. The key takeaway is you can't reclaim these foreign taxes on your UK VAT return.