Prices do not reflect VAT @ 20% discount?



I thought that the discount would be 20% at the very least!

 

Different vat rate. It’s 16.67% or something like that

 

You may be confusing a discount with a VAT tax to be reclaimed due to the international tax refund.

Tax refund applies only If you are taking goods outside the EU.
This shop has no idea whether your flight is to EU or outside EU, hence I think the pictured prices are just retail prices discounted due to the shop being located at the big airport (higher traffic = more potential customers).

 

PO’s @ £4,141.... x20%=£828.20. Add the two together.

 

Exactly. One doesn’t subtract 20% off the price with VAT included to get a new price, one adds the 20% to the lower price listed (MSRP without tax).

The prices on the right side of each placard correctly reflect the duty-free (no VAT) price.

 

You’d never see such poor maths skills on a rolex forum

 

lol you’d never see pictures of actual watches for sale to the general public on a Rolex forum either ;-)

 

Thanks for your input guys

 

LOL @steelfish

 

I was there just over 3 weeks ago and concluded, like you I think, that the savings were not that great.

 

I guess it depends on

I guess it depends on what you consider savings and the currency exchanges at the time. See the thread I started in April on my purchase in Heathrow Terminal 3:

https://omegaforums.net/threads/uh-oh-did-it-again.92864/

I bought my Seamaster 300 MC on a credit card with no foreign transaction fees. Considering both the weak Pound and the tiny amount I paid for duty into the United States (<$100), I saved a little over 25% over MSRP, 31% if I account for Florida sales tax. No AD I spoke with would give me such a deal.

I could have gotten it for a few hundred dollars less in the gray market, but:

1) I had the satisfaction of walking out the shop with the watch on my wrist and not having to worry it would actually arrive as promised.

2) it came with a full 5-year Omega warranty, not a partial warranty from what remained on the card from the Gray Market dealer, or a “warranty” from the seller which might or might not be any good.

To me, that’s worth a few hundred bucks.

 

Sales at a shop at an international airport are impulse buys, it's not a place where you are going to get a screaming deal. It's the last chance to rope a buyer before he leaves the country.

 

All fair points Evitzee and Donn Chambers. I hadn't done any research prior to travel and my mindset was definitely hoping that I'd see something which it would have been stupid to pass up so yes, impulse shopping. I dare say if I'd been seriously in the market for something or other it would have been a golden opportunity.

 

I had a good chat with the Heathrow AD a few months back. Think it was Harrods. Omega, IWC and some other brands give the discounted price if flying anywhere whereas Tudor and Rolex only allow the discounted price if flying outside the EU, e.g. USA. They know this from your boarding card that you need to show for any purchase in the terminal. This would suggest some kind of duty free (in the UK VAT at 20%), but it’s well known that duty free prices are not completely tax free (about 4% left on the table here)....a bit of a racket. You won’t get this level of discount from the Apple store though. For those of us who like buying from official outlets, but still want a good deal, this makes sense if you’re looking to buy and know a trip is on the horizon. My local Omega AD advised that prices in the UK would rise again soon and that discounts would be less than those I had been privileged to (his words to a good customer). In the past I’ve used knowledge of the Heathrow prices to get the AD to match or beat.

 

Was just thinking the same!

 

He said the latest pieces will be in store July and mentioned the currency issue. Suspect there’s an element of moving towards Rolex prices, although I’m no expert. I guess discounting hits hard, and it’s not sustainable. However, I bet most that buy a luxury watch do so once every blue moon and don’t notice price creep. Just know they can’t get a Submariner.

 

At Terminal 3 it was Watches of Switzerland.
I did ask if they had any Rolex sports pieces, in the hope that they had miraculously just taken delivery of a few!!

 

The “Retail” prices in the OP photo’s are the same as quoted on the Omega (UK) website, so MSRP. Therefore the “Heathrow” price IS the true net of VAT cost... as demonstrated in my earlier post £4,141 x20% = £4,970.

No “racket” in play here. You are simply not paying an extra 20% in Value Added Tax.