European Union
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Summary
Navigating the global tax compliance landscape successfully is complex and resource-intensive. Every country has a specific and constantly evolving set of legislated e-invoicing requirements.
Non-compliance, intentional or not, can result in significant financial penalties, business disruption, and reputational damage.
Updates
07.07.22
|The Group of the Future of VAT has discussed the "Working Paper on E-invoicing and the need for EU standards and interoperability" published by the European Commission. The study carried out on the Digital Reporting Requirements (DRR) part of the VAT in the Digital Age concludes that the policy options providing the most significant advantages are the partial and total harmonisation of DRRs across the EU.
More details around this can be found here.
04.28.22
|04.28.22
|04.28.22
|03.23.22
|02.04.22
|The European Commission has launched the public consultation on the “VAT in the Digital Age” initiative. The underlying aims of this initiative include ensuring the proper functioning of the single market, reducing business compliance costs and promoting economic interests of the EU and Member States.
The Commission is seeking feedback on VAT reporting obligations and e-invoicing, VAT treatment in the digital age and single EU VAT registration. The Commission aims to put forward legislative proposal in the latter part of the year to this effect. It is clear that a major initiative of the consultation is to harmonise fiscal measures across Europe.
The public consultation is open for 12 weeks from 21 January 2022 – 15 April 2022.
01.04.22
|On 7 December 2021, the EU Council received an agreement to update EU rules on VAT, the purpose of which was to ensure that member states are treated equally, with the bonus of allowing more flexibility to apply reduced and zero rates. There is also a ‘green’ initiative behind the rules, to phase out preferential treatments for environmentally harmful goods.
The EU Council also updated the list of goods and services for which reduced VAT rates are allowed (Annex 111 of the VAT Directive). The Council decided to limit the number of items to which reduced rates could be applied, recognising that these could accumulate.
01.04.22
|EU Member States have lost an estimated 134 billion euros in VAT revenues in 2019 according to the 2021 Report on the VAT Gap released by the European Commission. The VAT Gap did decrease between 2015-2019, but remains very significant. The report can be found here.
11.12.21
|The EU has been working towards the modernisation of current VAT rules in the commission Work Programme 2022. This Programme highlighted the importance of taking the opportunity to use digital solutions as a means to achieve this. As part of their action plan, they have announced a legislative proposal for 2022, covering VAT obligations and e-invoicing.
Further details can be found on the report published on their website.
11.12.21
|The European Parliament has been looking into ways of reducing the VAT gap- and has published a study to this effect. There was a particular focus on cross-border VAT fraud, which amounts to a colossal 50 billion Euros per year. The total VAT gap in Europe is estimated to be 165 billion Euros.
There have been a few measures which are seen as generally promising in reducing the VAT gap, including:
A binding EU-wide mandate for electronic invoicing is part of one of two proposed scenarios.
04.15.14
|The European Union (EU) VAT Directive 55 obliges all EU public authorities to receive invoices electronically, or at least to have a defined for how they will do so, by 27 November 2018.
04.15.14
|The European Union (EU) VAT Directive 55 obliges all EU public authorities to receive invoices electronically, or at least to have a defined for how they will do so, by 27 November 2018.
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