VAT Reclaim journey

[Benpointer]

I know there have been a few of these but I thought I would add our VAT reclaim journey to the mix.

 

We moved in on 23rd February 2026.   We received our BC completion certificate yesterday (18th june) following a painless final inspection.

 

I reviewed our spreadsheet of project VAT invoices today:  

• By comparing it with the spend spreadsheet I'd kept to manage the budget, I found an additional £1800 of VAT I could reclaim - not sure how I missed those before.
• Some of the paper invoice copies I had, proved to be no such thing - rather, sales orders or pro-forma invoices.  A few calls and emails managed to secure real VAT invoices.
• 161 invoices in total, totallying £20.9k VAT to claim
• Plenty of company names on invoices didn't match the official HMRC company names for specific VAT registration numbers.  For instance: Screwfix is really Kingfisher and Toolstation is really Travis Perkins (with the same VAT reg no.).  I am not sure how much of an issue that is but I corrected them anyway.
• We had maintained a spreadsheet in the HMRC template format so populating their template was a simple cut and paste.

 

I used the online HRMC form to submit the claim, guided by Google Gemini.  I know AI gets a bad rap but I really like Gemini.  I guess we'll see if my trust is misplaced.

 

Some points about the online submission.  There seem to be some trick questions, e.g:

• When did you occupy the property?  Gemini advises making sure it ties in with what the Council know because HMRC can check (really?)  But in our case that means three invoices since 23rd February could be discounted. I changed the spreadsheet description for these entries to make it clear we had to do this work to pass BC.  We'll see whether HMRC allow those.
• How many kitchens or utility rooms do you have?  In our case 1 of each.  Gemini advise entering 1 kitchen, 1 utility room but you can only put in a number, so I entered 1 (as in 1 kitchen or 1 utility room.  The risk in entering a number >1 is that HMRC assume it's a multi-residency project and will reject.

 

I received an email confirmation of my submission straight away, will keep you posted on progress or issues. 

 

Edited June 19 by Benpointer
typos

[Square Feet]

On 19/06/2026 at 21:34, Benpointer said:

• We had maintained a spreadsheet in the HMRC template format so populating their template was a simple cut and paste.

This looks like really good advice for someone like me who is at the start of their self-build. 

Sorry to be a pain, but I have googled and read a lot of HMRC's pages and I can't find this anywhere. Do you have a link to the template please?

[Square Feet]

On 19/06/2026 at 21:34, Benpointer said:

• 161 invoices in total, totallying £20.9k VAT to claim

Can I ask what this is as a rough percentage of total spend?  I've put VAT reclaim into my figures at 5% of the total cost. I know it's 20% but I've reckoned on being able to claim back on around a quarter of expenditure. Does this seem about right?

[Benpointer]

10 hours ago, Square Feet said:

This looks like really good advice for someone like me who is at the start of their self-build. 

Sorry to be a pain, but I have googled and read a lot of HMRC's pages and I can't find this anywhere. Do you have a link to the template please?

 

Hi Square Feet,

 

Here's an empty copy of the spreadsheet I created.  

 

VAT invoices template.xlsx

 

It's based on the format of Table A from the reclaim form https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65858474fc07f300128d46e8/VAT431NB.pdf

 

The total VAT we're reclaiming is quite a small %age of our total spend because most of the spend was on zero-rated build and install work where the contractors supplied the materials. The big ticket items of groundworks, timber fram, windows, zinc roof, solar PV and electrics, were all in this category.  

 

Our main materials spend items were timber cladding, floor tiles, kitchen units, doors, lighting, insulation, plus lots of timber and fixings.   

 

How much you will be claiming back depends on how much you put through contractors and how much materials you buy yourself.

 

Hope that helps.

 

Ben

[Square Feet]

@Benpointer Nice one thanks for the spreasheet info. 

Yes, I've read the whole of the VAT reclaim thread but was just wondering if my 'back of an envelope' figure was roughly within range. I get that it's oranges and apples though. 

Cheers

[Benpointer]

Depending on the amount you buy direct, 5% of total cost sounds reasonable to me. 👍

[BotusBuild]

Mine is/will be about 10% (or second hand Aston Martin sized) 🤣

[G and J]

1 hour ago, BotusBuild said:

Mine is/will be about 10%

Ours too, but as suggested above depends how you buy. We have sourced the majority of things.

[Benpointer]

19 hours ago, BotusBuild said:

Mine is/will be about 10% (or second hand Aston Martin sized) 🤣

 

Wow, that must have been a big build!

Aston Martin DB5 estimated to fetch almost £500,000

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn00d30gw7xo

Edited Tuesday at 06:46 by Benpointer

[Bonner]

On 19/06/2026 at 21:34, Benpointer said:

When did you occupy the property?

Doesn’t matter really, at least in England. We declared occupation over a year before completion. We also claimed for expenditure after completion (allowable decoration and landscaping etc.)

On 19/06/2026 at 21:34, Benpointer said:

How many kitchens or utility rooms do you have?

Again doesn’t matter as long as it is an individual dwelling, it’s the planning permission which meets the criteria not the number of rooms.

[miike]

On 23/06/2026 at 08:17, Bonner said:

Doesn’t matter really, at least in England. We declared occupation over a year before completion. We also claimed for expenditure after completion (allowable decoration and landscaping etc.)

Again doesn’t matter as long as it is an individual dwelling, it’s the planning permission which meets the criteria not the number of rooms.

 

I'm 

On 19/06/2026 at 21:34, Benpointer said:

I know there have been a few of these but I thought I would add our VAT reclaim journey to the mix.

 

We moved in on 23rd February 2026.   We received our BC completion certificate yesterday (18th june) following a painless final inspection.

 

I reviewed our spreadsheet of project VAT invoices today:  

• By comparing it with the spend spreadsheet I'd kept to manage the budget, I found an additional £1800 of VAT I could reclaim - not sure how I missed those before.
• Some of the paper invoice copies I had, proved to be no such thing - rather, sales orders or pro-forma invoices.  A few calls and emails managed to secure real VAT invoices.
• 161 invoices in total, totallying £20.9k VAT to claim
• Plenty of company names on invoices didn't match the official HMRC company names for specific VAT registration numbers.  For instance: Screwfix is really Kingfisher and Toolstation is really Travis Perkins (with the same VAT reg no.).  I am not sure how much of an issue that is but I corrected them anyway.
• We had maintained a spreadsheet in the HMRC template format so populating their template was a simple cut and paste.

 

I used the online HRMC form to submit the claim, guided by Google Gemini.  I know AI gets a bad rap but I really like Gemini.  I guess we'll see if my trust is misplaced.

 

Some points about the online submission.  There seem to be some trick questions, e.g:

• When did you occupy the property?  Gemini advises making sure it ties in with what the Council know because HMRC can check (really?)  But in our case that means three invoices since 23rd February could be discounted. I changed the spreadsheet description for these entries to make it clear we had to do this work to pass BC.  We'll see whether HMRC allow those.
• How many kitchens or utility rooms do you have?  In our case 1 of each.  Gemini advise entering 1 kitchen, 1 utility room but you can only put in a number, so I entered 1 (as in 1 kitchen or 1 utility room.  The risk in entering a number >1 is that HMRC assume it's a multi-residency project and will reject.

 

I received an email confirmation of my submission straight away, will keep you posted on progress or issues. 

 

 

I used Claude to help with mine. Had ~600 invoices/receipts and so many companies seem to make it difficult to just know the proper company name and VAT number. I got Claude to research the proper names and associated VAT numbers and put them in the spreadsheet. Still waiting for a response from HMRC so will see how it goes.

 

Not sure about your last point - the house needs a kitchen to habitable, so the number must be at least 1 on that alone. If they're asking about utility rooms in the same question, then it seems logical that the answer would be 2 if you have one as well. I took the question as them trying to gauge what the realistic spend for your build would be. Submitting a 200k reclaim on a 500sqft house with a small kitchen seems far more irregular than on a 10,000sqft house with main kitchen, chefs kitchen, annex kitchen etc.