7:15 am, August 26, 2025
A used car and van dealership has been fined more than £200,000 after appearing on a government list of deliberate tax defaulters.
According HMRC, the Stanmore-based Auto Capital Limited intentionally avoided an eye watering £252,071 in tax, which was owed between September and November 2021.
The firm, which turned over £16.31m in its most recent set of annual accounts, was fined £201,656 for dodging the tax and publicly named and shamed by HMRC.
According to Companies House, the outfit specialises in the ‘sale of used cars and light motor vehicles’ and saw profits tumble in its most recent accounts from £1.57m to just £9,655.
Car Dealer has approached Auto Capital Limited for comment.
The tax office says that the defaulters list only includes firms penalised under civil procedures and does not include criminal convictions for tax fraud.
Offenders details will remain available on the government’s website for the next year as part of a bid to ‘influence taxpayer behaviour and encourage defaulters to engage with HMRC.’
Auto Capital Limited was the only party to be named on the most recent list, published earlier this summer, although a longer list, posted in July, included further names from the motor trade.
Up first, Cumbrian car dealer Gareth Fennell was found to have intentionally dodged £51,855.52 in tax, which was owed in December 2023.
Fennell, who traded as Gareth Fennell Cars, has since seen his company wound up but was still fined £19,964.37 for the unpaid bill.
Elsewhere, vehicle breaker Abiodun Idowu Sanni was fined 22,143.86 over an unpaid tax bill of £43,207.59 between April 2016 and April 2021.
On its website, HMRC says of the list: ‘These deliberate acts have resulted in HMRC establishing an additional amount of tax of more than £25,000.
‘HMRC will only publish the details where the taxpayer has not made a full and immediate disclosure when HMRC started to investigate or prior to any investigation.
‘The list relates to deliberate defaulters who’ve been dealt with using civil proceedings.
‘The list does not contain details of criminal convictions of those found guilty of a criminal offence in open court and therefore the verdict and sentence is a matter of public record.’
The updated lists come after Car Dealer reported earlier this year how Derek McCarrity, of Newtownabbey, Northern Ireland, had been fined £2.14m for dodging a staggering £3.15m in tax relating to his car sales business, between May 2010 and 31 October 2011, as well as from February 2012 to March 2024.
The latest lists can be viewed here.
