Sign in / up

back to article Dell Corp UK makes 1.46% net profit margin on £1.556bn in sales – 'satisfactory' apparently

Dell Corporation's UK wing has reported a net profit of £22.77m on a turnover of £1.556bn, according to Profit and Loss accounts (PDF) for fiscal '18 filed with Companies House. Bizarrely, the business described this net profit margin of 1.46 per cent as "satisfactory". Could it be the result of some creative accounting or are …

COMMENTS

Post your comment
House rules Send corrections
Add to 'My topics' unstar *
  1. ragnar

    I can answer your main question - the level of profit probably is considered satisfactory for a limited risk distributor and shouldn't be considered a mark of commercial failure in any way.

    If it's designated as such, then its goods and services will be transfer priced to achieve a low profit margin in that range. The idea being that the small level of profits are in line with the arm's length level of profits a 3rd party company would expect to earn if it had a business with such limited risks. Profits instead accrue to the entity taking all the commercial risk, presumably the US for Dell?

    5 0 Reply
  2. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    I think they sold few of those 13M laptops...

    ... so most of the revenues were actually form the usual low price low margin products... and after the usual "expenses" they found their satisfactory margin.

    1 1 Reply
  3. Alan Sharkey

    Something's not right

    They do more than 10K's worth of PS business in the UK. I see some "creative accounting" here.

    5 1 Reply
  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Low profit -> Low Tax

    If you don't make a profit they can't tax you on it.

    It would be interesting to see how much "Dell UK" paid to "Dell Cayman Islands" in "administrative charges"

    12 0 Reply
  5. Stuart Halliday

    Smaller margin than the Farmers get for their Milk?

    Should we be therefore be subsidizing them? ;)

    3 0 Reply
    1. Hans 1
      Reply Icon

      That is the plan!

      Make them look poor ... Dell "<insert_favorite_tax_haven>" will have billions in net profit.

      2 0 Reply
  6. Joe Harrison

    Very odd company

    Friend wanted one of the new Dell XPS13 laptops and some accessories, but every time she got to "checkout" on the Dell website the price 1700 ish quid jumped up by another 70. I checked her browser configuration for funny cookies or whatever but it was clearly Dell's ordering system at fault. Contacted Dell via webchat and they insisted that she pay 1500 ish. Not complaining of course but no wonder profits are low.

    2 0 Reply
    1. AndyS
      Reply Icon

      Re: Very odd company

      I ordered an XPS13 with Ubuntu on it. It was the oddest experience.

      The computer took so long to ship that my card, linked to the paypal account I payed with, had expired. Instead of holding the shipment when the payment failed, they shipped anyway, and some Indian team were then in charge of trying to get me to pay.

      I asked them several times to send me a simple, correct invoice that I could pay via paypal. Eventually, a couple of weeks after the laptop arrived, I got an invoice, without VAT.

      By that point, VAT was their problem, and I couldn't be bothered helping them any more, so I paid it.

      Some months later, I got another email, from a UK team, asking me to pay the full amount (which was apparently still outstanding on my account). I ignored that, and have never heard back from them.

      I've no idea how much they think I owe them, or what will happen if I ever try to order another machine from them...

      2 0 Reply
      1. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Very odd company

        Sounds familiar. A friend has cancelled an order after the "machine on the shelf ready to ship" that the sales person chose because "it is ready to ship today" is 3-4 weeks late and still no delivery day.

        Problem is, friend still insists of only going with them because "Dell".

        1 0 Reply

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

Forgotten password ?

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like