bringing bike down from northern ireland

jimmyc06

i'm looking at buying a bike in northrn ireland and bringing it down. i'm interested in getting an 09 250cc motorbike. am i right in saying that the vrt is €500? is there any other expenses to factor in? Has anyone here done this?

galwaytt

...you'll have to pay 21.5% VAT on :

The price of the bike
+VRT
+any costs they deem it took to get it down here (e.g. carriage).

It couldn't be worth your while, surely ? What kind of bike is it ?

jimmyc06

a kawasaki 250r, got a price of €5300 for it down south, same bike £3500 up north, with the sterling at the moment this works out around €3800 and the €500 for vrt this works out at €4300 surely this is a much better offer??? This is a saving of €1000

carsQhere

According to https://www.ros.ie/VRTEnquiryServlet/showVRT the VRT is 498 so you seem to be correct on that score.

Not sure what the VAT situation would be though, with it being a new (unregistered) bike.

jimmyc06

would the VAT not be included in the sale price? or would I have to pay an additional VAT bringing it in? Is this not the VRT, Any help would be appreciated as I've no ideal about this

murphaph

You take the UK VAT off as the bike is being exported from the UK and VAT paid in another EU jurisdiction. You don't have to pay VAT twice, just RoI VAT. The dealer should be familiar with this practice.

galwaytt

UK vat is in the sale price - ROI vat, isn't. Theirs is 15%, ours is 21.5%

You'll have to pay the vat in N.I., bring it down here, pay VRT, VAT here, and then armed with your new proof-of-VAT-payment, reclaim the UK vat.

The dealer can't sell it without VAT in NI unless you've a VAT no, and you won't be allowed to ride it away, either in that case.


I hope you're not in a hurry !

brian plank

i was talking to a retired guard one day who had a northern reg bike. he was riding it on the NI plates till he had 6000 km up on it before registering it down here.

the reason being that once a bike is over 6 months old or has 6000 km on it its not considered new and you dont pay vat.

boo-urns

You don't have to pay VAT on a new bike in NI - the dealer can sell it to you for export without VAT even if you don't have a VAT number. The only issue you'll have is getting it back to ROI - if the bike hasn't been regsitered in NI then you'll need a van to get it back to ROI and won't be allowed drive it on any roads without it being registered first.
I bought a new bike in NI last year and the dealer sold it to me without the VAT. I did have a nice big fat VAT and VRT bill to pay when I registered it in the republic though but it was still well worth my while buying it up there.

Steffano2002

galwaytt wrote: »

You'll have to pay the vat in N.I., bring it down here, pay VRT, VAT here, and then armed with your new proof-of-VAT-payment, reclaim the UK vat.

I'm pretty sure that's incorrect. I've heard of dealers in the UK selling bikes ex-VAT to private customers (i.e. no VAT number).

jimmyc06: The VRT and the VAT at 21.5% will make it very expensive to import a new bike... Why don't you try and find a second hand 250R that is more than 6 months old AND has more than 6,000km? That will save you the guts of a grand...

Popeleo

I did this last year - straightforward to do in the end but finding clear information was a pain in the ass. A good dealer should be able to sell you a bike for export without the UK's VAT. Shop around for value with the currency too - the difference between the lowest and highest rates of exchange can be crazy. Also the rates for cash and bank drafts differ.

Going by your details and using the current exchange rate, you should be paying a total of about 4,500-4,600 Euro if you buy it up there for export (ex-VAT) and pay your VRT (€498) and VAT (€700ish) bills to register it in the south.

Plus whatever delivery charges - I just rode mine down and registered it in Santry the next day.

jimmyc06

thanks pope leo, out of curiosity(Probably spelt that wrong!) where did you buy your bike? had you much hassle changing it over? do you reckon that 4600 would cover the whole cost of the bike?

Popeleo

jimmyc06 wrote: »

thanks pope leo, out of curiosity(Probably spelt that wrong!) where did you buy your bike? had you much hassle changing it over? do you reckon that 4600 would cover the whole cost of the bike?

Going by my experience and the figures you quoted, you should be well covered. Take the 15% UK VAT off the 3,500 stg and it's 3,044 stg. That's what you pay the dealer.

Stick on about 10% to the 3,044 to cover bank charges and exchange rate and that's about 3350 Euro.

Your VRT is fixed (249x2) and the VAT is 21.5% of whatever you paid. You are charged VRT at the end, so you don't pay VAT on it.

The taxmen use the day's market rate for currency, so that's your 3,044 plus say 8% to convert into Euro - they'll charge you 21.5% of this figure
(3,044 x 1.08) = 3287.52; 3287.52 * 0.215 = 706.82

So 3350 + 707 + 498 = 4,555.

Enough change from 4,600 to buy your petrol, a number plate and a celebratory pint.

Popeleo

As for the rest of your question, there is no changing over - I bought a bike for export so it was never registered in the UK. The dealer has to fill out forms for the UK tax people to do this and they need some ID to prove you're exporting it (my Irish licence was fine).

Just talk it over with the dealer beforehand so they know what you're doing and that you know that they're clued in. It's all straightforward once the dealer knows how to fill out the forms.

As for which dealer, I'm not going to pimp them here but they're an official Aprilia dealer (that's what I bought) and were good to deal with - PM me if you want to know their name.

agent_smith

Dropped into the lads in redzone in kimmage there. They are dropped the the price of yamaha range fairly substantially. It now works out cheaper base metal price to buy the bike from the lads in redzone than to go up north or across the pond... at least it would work out more expensive when i did my calculations to bring in a new r1.
Might be worth popping into them in kimmage. Surely if danfay ireland/yamaha ireland are dropping the base metal price here to compensate for sterling etc.. then it will mean other dealers will start to follow suit..

P.C.

There are some good deals to be had on new bikes in Dublin - it depends on which bike.

The bike that the OP is talking about - Kawasaki Ninja 250r (I think) - is not going for a good price anywhere that I can find, and you could save up to € 1 000 by buying it up north.

If you are looking for a Yamaha, see the post above - very good deals to be had.

I have been looking around for an affordable 250cc bike, as a starter bike, and there are not any that I can find.
I was offered a brand new restricted Fazer 600 for € 1 200 more than the Kawasaki 250. :eek:

Wossack

saved almost 2k buyin my trumpet up north

if your NI dealer can sell for immediate export, you dont have to worry bout the UK VAT at all, just the irish VAT + VRT