Newsletters are usually zero-rated (0% VAT) in the UK, but only if they meet HMRC's conditions: printed (the email version isn't this item) (HMRC VAT Notice 701/10, paragraph 3.6).
Newsletters
0% VAT
Newsletters are zero-rated, either as periodicals or as leaflets.
HMRC VAT Notice 701/10, paragraph 3.6
0% as long as it's:
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A newsletter can reach the zero rate by either of two doors, which is why it so rarely goes wrong. If it is issued in a series at regular intervals it is a periodical under 3.6, and bulletins and staff journals are both listed as zero-rated in section 8. If it is a one-off, it is a single sheet or a few sheets of reading matter, so it is judged as a leaflet or a brochure instead. The second route brings the leaflet conditions with it, so a one-off newsletter printed as a laminated sheet for a noticeboard is standard-rated, while the same content issued monthly and posted out is not.
Issued regularly, or judged as a leaflet. Displayed rather than read is the way it fails both.
The zero rate applies as long as it's: printed (the email version isn't this item). If any one of those isn't true, it isn't zero-rated, so it's 20%.
If your printer does the design, typesetting or finishing as part of the same zero-rated print job, that work can be zero-rated too. Design bought separately from a studio is a standard-rated service.
HMRC VAT Notice 701/10, paragraph 3.6, HMRC's guidance on zero rating books and printed matter. See the notices we work from.
A periodical issued at regular intervals, and staff journals are listed as zero-rated.
Not a periodical, but a sheet held and read in the hand, so a leaflet.
Laminated and for display, so it fails the leaflet conditions and is not a series.