Value Added Tax Act 1994 section 53

Cancellation of registration

Section 53 sets out the circumstances in which HMRC may cancel a person's VAT registration under this part of the schedule, including voluntary cancellation on request, cancellation for non-compliance, and retrospective cancellation where registration should never have been granted.

• A registered person who can demonstrate they are no longer liable to be registered may request cancellation, effective from the date of the request or a later agreed date.
• HMRC may cancel the registration of a person who registered voluntarily but never started making the relevant supplies, never exercised the stated option, or breached a condition of their registration.
• HMRC cannot cancel a registration at any point in time when the person would still be required (or, in voluntary registration cases, entitled) to be registered under another provision of the VAT Act.
• Where a person exercised an option under paragraph 48(2), their registration cannot be cancelled before 1 January following the second anniversary of the date their registration took effect.