The principles of electronic filing
Thursday January 14, 2010
From 1st January 2010 the current system for making 8th Directive claims will be replaced by an electronic system. The new electronic system will apply to all applications made after 1st January 2010 even if the expenditure was incurred in 2009. The same general rules will apply but the method for claiming is completely revised and should make recovery much easier.
Submitting through the portal
The new electronic cross border refund system enables a business that incurs VAT on expenditure in a Member State where it is not established and makes no supplies, to recover the VAT directly from the Member State. The way the system will work is that the business will make the claims via an electronic portal in its own member state. A separate application will be made for each member state. So if a UK business has claims in France, Germany and Poland it will make three separate claims via the UK’s electronic portal. The member state of establishment will check whether the claimant is registered for VAT and pass the claims onto the relevant country for refund.
- The application will have standard fields for details of the business, the expenditure, and so on. Each item of expenditure has an expenditure code. Member states may require submission in their own language but we believe that most member states will allow the use of a second language and English is the common choice.
- The applications must be made by 30th September in the year following the date of expenditure.
- Tax authorities will be required to come to a quick decision: claims ought to be settled no more than four months after the submission deadline. Interest will automatically be payable on delayed claims.
Contact us for assistance with preparation for electronic VAT submission.
For an overview of tax authority implementation schedules, please click here.
To learn how reduce cross-border VAT costs now, please click here.