Charities that have collected donations from the public via text messages deserve to be paid compensation where phone companies have charged VAT on the texts.
This is the view of Fianna Fáil Galway West TD Éamon Ó Cuív who is calling on the Minister for Finance Michael Noonan to address the issue.
In reply to a Dáil question from Dep Ó Cuív, Minister Noonan admitted that mobile phone providers had been incorrectly charging VAT on charitable donations made via text messages.
This means that the Revenue Commissioners have collected money that rightly belongs to the charities in question.
The Minister also confirmed that donations made via SMS text messages, excluding any fees charged by the telecommunications provider, are outside the scope of Irish VAT laws.
Dep Ó Cuív now wants to see the Minister to make a compensatory grant payment to the charities in question.
“It will be easy enough to establish the amount of money owing to each charity,” he said, “by asking them to verify the amount of donations received via text message and calculating the misappropriated VAT accordingly
