As is the Qatar tax year, so probably made sense for all parties

Likewise Ireland. They changed from April in 2002. I'm not being trivial, there's probably more leasing fleet registered in Ireland than anywhere else comparable, and the whole reason is the tax breaks offered.

Likewise France.

Of course. If your new jet was missing a major interior component you'd sign off the acceptance which would be required for the delivery to take place? Maybe Qatar doesn't bother with such trivial details as acceptance inspections? This article and thread is really "low intelligence", yawn...

Absolutely right. 737-200 Line Number 500 was held up pending final payment. A good party spoilt after all the GF glitterati had gathered in the US! It was only a cash flow cum bank hold up though. Not like this, which must surely be a well-organised contractural wangle. Not easy presumably to find so many crews to operate these flights. Good day’s work for somebody though. “Tough in the Gulf” we used to say....

No. While many entities in the US use the January-December calendar year as a tax year, and some (including individuals) are required to, many others use fiscal years, which are 12-month periods that may end on the last day of any quarter -- March 31, June 30, September 30 or December 31.

Boeing probably has a quarterly financial report wef 31 Dec. A few extra 787 "deliveries" might just get the figures up to horrific

Probably more frequently than one thinks, it may occur that buyer and seller decide to accept the aircraft not fully ready, if both parties have some interest doing so; the discrepancies are listed as reserves. As mentioned in some posts above, it may be for a lot of reasons including taxes (end of a specific regime for instance) or to benefit from investors support before a given date.
In such case, both parties agree on possible compensations and a schedule to correct which should have not been accepted.

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Boeing's financial year ends Dec 31st. I worked for 20 years for the sales side of an American corporation The emphasis was always on pushing as much out of the door by midnight Dec 31st as possible.

This speculation about taxes etc puzzles me. I am assuming the implication here is that there is a form of sales tax payable. In Europe, the equivalent is VAT (Value Added Tax) and if one pays VAT when purchasing an item and that item is then exported, the VAT is refundable so the purchase effectively is a zero tax item. Doesn't the US have a similar form of tax break available for exports?
Also, I thought I had read that Washington State gave Boeing all manner of tax breaks and, as for Qatari taxes, I am sure there won't be any as the airline is government owned.
Someone mentioned tax related wheezes such as flying offshore for the delivery paperwork to be completed. If that was the case, wouldn't all customers do the same? In the case of the Qatari aircraft, they could have been flown from Seattle to Victorville via a large loop over the Pacific? Also, if delivery had not been finalised when the aircraft left Boeing, why would Boeing allow the new owner's crew to make the flights? "When you own it, you can fly it".
There have been occasions when British Airways have taken delivery of new aircraft which needed new seating arrangements fitted. In those cases, BA flew the aircraft to London, then on to Cardiff for the seat installation. If there had been potential tax advantages to doing the same as Qatar, I am sure the BA bean counters would have spotted this and taken advantage.

In the US there is no federal sales tax. There are different sales taxes in different states and they are handled differently (e.g. refund on export).

How do you know Qatari pilots were flying them?
Just askin for a friend....

Hello

I have already posted a response once on this, but for some reason it has been removed. Not quite sure why and wanted to highlight in this day and age how crazy some things can be. Below, more or less, is my post again

If these B787 delivery flights are purely for financial/legal reasons then, Greta Thunberg would in this instance be quite correct if she said "The law is an ass". This means that "An application of the law that is contrary to common sense", and the use of the word ass is in the British sense referring to a donkey!

Perhaps it is time to spend a moment's thought for all the staff that got involved. Lawyers, Accountants, Flight Ops back-office, Ground handling, Pilots.

Both on the side of BA and QR, everyone must had been plucking their hair out at the absurdity, screaming their brains out. Still, by the end of the day it was the best available option.

I guess this would never apply to anything as costly as a B787, but we used to get a lot of orders at the year end from people using up their budget before it evaporated. After the previous management had lost several orders (Sorry, we can't deliver before the year end), I arranged to have several machines all crated up and ready for their delivery address labels each March. If the rules are funny-peculiar, you may as well take (sane) advantage of them.

The Qatar source web site reports that the 7 were delivered, Paine Field to Doha, with only the economy cabins fitted. Next reports say they have now positioned to Victorville for business class cabin fitting (as originally speculated).

Ivan, my point exactly. I think we can see aviation being targeted more by environmentalists than it before. Offsets are all very well but I think the aviation industry, along with others, really needs to clean up it's act. We can be sure that Qatar Airways have done their homework and these flights make total sense from a financial point of view maybe even taken offset into account. However the ammunition it can give to those who say we should address our emissions more seriously is IMHO almost crass.

Happy New Year to all.

And Spain and Italy, tax year 1st Jan to 31st Dec

Rightly said, legal yes, but...ethically and . politically ( and climate sense..) not so much