Databank Systems Ltd v Commissioner of Inland Revenue - [1990] 3 NZLR 385

Revenue — Goods and services tax — Exempt supply — Financial services — Agent — Databank carried out various computer and other activities for four trading banks — Whether those activities were a supply of financial services and therefore exempt from GST — Whether Databank supplied services to each bank's customers as the agent of the bank — Goods and Services Tax Act 1985, ss 3, 6, 8, 14 and 60. — Appeal from [1989] 1 NZLR 422

Statutes — Interpretation — Amending Act — Court of Appeal decision held that certain activities of Databank were financial services and exempt from GST — Commissioner appealed — Before appeal was heard Parliament amended the relevant sections of the Goods and Services Tax Act 1985 to negate the Court of Appeal's decision for the future — Whether the Goods and Services Tax Amendment Act (No 2) 1989, which was neither retrospective nor expressed to resolve an ambiguity, could be called in aid to construe the principal Act in deciding whether services supplied before the amending Act came into force were exempt from GST.