back to article No Court of Appeal for you! Judges uphold Aria PC firm VAT fraud ruling

Aria Technology has been denied permission to appeal against a tax court's ruling that the PC and components dealer diddled HMRC out of £750,000 of VAT through a VAT carousel fraud. The news comes on the anniversary of the company trying and failing to gag The Register from reporting about its scheduled 2018 appeal in the …

  1. Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse

    Betteridge's law...

    Is there an equivalent to Betteridge's law for the breaking out and asking of a question in parenthesis in the middle of a sentence, as per the below? And if so, have I also (maybe?) just invoked it?

    "Her decision seems to be based on either on an emotive bias, lack of time and resources (is her caseload too much?), lack of training, all three or some other unknown factor."

    1. chuckufarley Silver badge

      Re: Betteridge's law...

      I guess being guilty of tax fraud is considered an unknown factor. How odd.

    2. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

      Re: Betteridge's law...

      Betteridge's law is of course that "if a news headline asks a question then the answer is 'no'", and is a frequently used joke in "Private Eye" magazine.

      I haven't researched the situation that caught your eye in other instances of an interposed question (parenthetical or hyphenated), but a principle that might be tested and found consistently reliable is a "Better leave it out law."

      A slightly related matter (without checking the actual statement for it) is whatever you call one word or perhaps phrase stuffed inside another one, like "abso-jolly-lutely", which I cleaned up. I think Stephen Fry mentioned it on a "QI", and yes those are lovingly transcribed online somewhere, but I don't remember the actual example given, and in fact I think it was bleeped.

      1. A Nother Handle

        Re: Betteridge's law...

        I think the word you're looking for is tmesis.

        1. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

          Re: Betteridge's law...

          "Tmesis". So 'tis, nuncle! Thank 'ee!

          I really must remember it for Scrabble!

  2. Trollslayer
    Thumb Up

    When El Reg jokes

    They joke but beware when they get serious about journalism.

  3. x 7

    so why are Aria still in business?

  4. David Neil

    Fumming here

    PM me, 2 many sneks on here xxox

  5. Aqua Marina

    OEM

    Well he’s correct that the market does refer to any non-retail CPU as OEM. I’ve got VIP, Scan and Dabs Direct price lists here going back to the 90s. They all say OEM. Maybe they should stop the practice before HMRC comes knocking on the door.

    1. Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse

      Re: OEM

      I always thought that OEM just meant "same product" but in a brown cardboard box rather than all of the flashy marketing bumff. I've been buying OEM components "retail" for home use from a large well known supplier for years.

      Perhaps they need to be careful then?

      1. Paul Shirley

        Re: OEM

        It can also mean no coolers with CPUs, no migration tools with hard drives, no fixing bits with almost anything and so on. Definitely not a safe option for complete beginners.

        Of late OEM part sales have got stranger, the retail versions of my last few hard drives were cheaper than OEM!

  6. tokamaktech
    Trollface

    Read his statement again, only imagine it in Donald Trump's voice.

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