VAT: decisions on 600 jobs 'in weeks'

COMPANIES with some 600 staff in the fulfilment industry will decide whether to leave Guernsey within a couple of weeks, but the outlook is not overly optimistic, the Bulk Mailers' Association said yesterday.

That view from the industry body came as Paul Domaille, the managing director of Classic Flowers, who employs three people, warned that it would be local businesses that would suffer in the long term, as he believed large UK companies could just leave.

He was responding after the Channel Islands lost its legal bid to stop the UK Government scrapping low value consignment relief for imports from the CI.

Bulk Mailers' Association chairman Rodney Brouard said the only two companies he knew that were leaving so far were Healthspan, which announced on Thursday that it was to close its warehouse, and 7dayshop.com.

'Some will be deciding over the next two weeks what they are going to do,' he said.