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Norway and Switzerland are outside EU, so customers from these countries are not concerned anyway. These new VAT regulations don't change the jurisdiction: non-EU customers of EU providers don't pay VAT. From 01.01.2015 VAT will be charged according to the VAT rate of the customer's land, INSIDE EU. Non-EU customers are not concerned, like before.
That was good news then, but I really wonder what the Norwegian Government is planning to bring in VAT money from rest of the world, if they can't use the system EU is starting with now. One thing is for sure, Norway don't let a dime go if there is a possible to get them in.
correct - and @rds100 didn't say anything else ;-)
BUT probably wanted to mention, that counties outside the EU but having VAT may follow this system shortly with their own laws...
If anyone is unsure about this just make sure you get some advice as soon as possible, don't rely on a forum thread or the advice within to determine whether you should act or not.
For those in the UK that are thinking about avoiding this.
HMRC debt never expires or goes away other than through payment, settlement or Bankruptcy no matter how many years pass.
If you are a minor accepting payment for services then responsibility for payment of anything due to the crown falls to your legal guardian.
Should you end up on the wrong side of HMRC and they look at your service they will simply make an assessment of taxes due if your record keeping is not up to date, any assessment they make is not for them to prove you owe, it is for you to disprove. If you are unable to disprove the assessment you are liable for it.
Remember you can't shake off the question "are you vat registered" with a "yes", you should be displaying a vat reg number.
On the plus side also remember you can offset, i.e. input/output calculation.
absolutely recommended!! doesn't help much to discuss nor disagree with something, if you are on the weaker end of the branch...
actually, Skatteetaten since 2011, has a regulation, where it says that a foreign entity selling electronic products/services to norwegian customers, must register by the norwegian tax office (and pay VAT with the same 50.000 kr treshold rule than local norwegian entities). See:
https://altinn.no/no/Start-and-Run-a-Business/Operation/Direct-and-indirect-taxes/VAT-reporting/Services-purchased-from-abroad/?epslanguage=no
but:
because non-EU customers are not required by EU law to pay VAT on electronic services bought in EU, there's no database linking EU and non-EU tax administrations, so in case of Norway, Skatteetaten. And similarly about other countries (Japan, Russia, USA, etc.)
Skatteetaten has no other way to check what/where people buy online, unless they could scan bank transactions. Now that would require an infrastructure that, for instance, would beep somewhere when the 7€ I pay to Hetzner for a VPS each month, gets out of my Nordea account through VISA, and that checks what these 7€ are.
Moreover in some cases, even the interconnected VIsa/Master/SWIFT banking meta-network can be avoided. But well there's no need for most people.
(A special case is the one of the big international online business, like Ebay. Because they are so big and so popular they are targeted by tax regulations)
@abravo
Ok, I was looking for that info. Thank you. So what that says is if one of my small EU (or US) host is selling services for more then 50.000 NOK to Norwegian customers, they should in theory register in the Norwegian VAT system an charge all Norwegian customers VAT. But if they don't sell for 50.000 NOK/year, they don't need to collect VAT from Norwegian customers, and we are not affected by the new VAT rule that start now i 2015 for rest of the EU?
this, but only as long as you are the customer in this game ;-)
absolutt!
hosts selling to norwegian customers should in theory do the simplified moms procedure and therefore pay in case of over 50.000 kr/å. In theory, because how to enforce such rule?
Yet another purely theorical regulation of Skatteetaten ...
And as customer, yes, we are not affected by the new EU rule. Basically the new EU rule only change VAT rates among EU customers/merchants.
See for instance what Hetzner explains very simply.
wiki.hetzner.de/index.php/Payment_FAQ/en#How_much_VAT_do_I_need_to_pay.3F
got this email this morning, guess it only matters IN THE EU? But this is a UK company anyway I think?
Hello XXX (XXX),
VAT laws have changed in the UK which mean that we will need to charge VAT on sales generated and invoices created via all non-UK EU member countries.
The countries effected include: Austria, Belgium, Bulharia, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Solvakia, Slovenia, Spain & Sweden.
VAT to automatically be applied to invoices and orders from the above countries as the VAT rate of that country.
If you own a VAT registered company you will be able to add your VAT number in your account under my details which will make your account VAT exempt thus you won't be effected by this change.
If you have any unpaid invoices or had plans to create a new order we would urge you to do this within the next 12 hours to avoid the coming tax changes.
Regards,
Jack Curtis,
Zomex.com
again and again :-)
it only affects you, if you are either a customer in europe or are a company (no matter where) dealing with customers in europe.
What are you using for the bridge?
There's only one I think and thats by EdgeHosting. It worked as it should when I used it, doesn't support automatically adding credit(add fund) invoices though.
Registered for MOSS on the 31st of December and got our VAT ID today - fast. The system itself is pretty simple and straightforward. Not sure how the heck can we control client's trustworthiness with details they submit into our billing system. But, hell, we will figure something out along the way.
Hope someone is actually having a great start of a year these EU-vat-mess days.
Are you taking payments via Paypal only? If so use the customers country that they provide. Any other ones, you basically need to try and wangle to use the exception -
So as long as you can get a country information from the party who handles your payments your covered till July. Its from July it gets fun, and you need to do real time IP validation, country code matching, etc.
I'm expecting more emails like this:
I do wonder whether they mean they are just not willing to provide services due to the hassle for them of registering for VAT or they actually think they can't.
The first paragraph says "will no longer be allowed to sell services to customers residing in the European Union".
I'd say both.
if they're just not willing to collect VAT and register for a VAT ID etc., they will be no longer allowed to sell ;-)
Probably, unless it's really worthwhile depending on your European client base I do think as @SwordfishBE said that more of these emails will be sent.
That's an entire 28 countries they just lost.. Wow... just because they don't want to?
Is it that much to lose that much revenue? Wow..
I think this is really going to
1) Sort out fly by hosts in the eu
2) Piss off a lot of EU customers :P
I guess it really depends though on your EU client base. I mean if you have been in business say 3 years. based in the US and in that time you only have a handful of clients in the EU then it's not going to be worth your while.
However having said that, your point 1 is well made, there are going to be many hosts in the EU that simply can't/won't register for VAT and they will clearly stand out for all the wrong reasons.
It will be interesting to see how it develops over the next month or two.
You could also start using bitcoins for payment, these are VAT Exempt in a lot of country's - Including the UK, Belgium and Finland.
// Incorrect as said by @W1V_Lee below.
Source: https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/finland-rules-bitcoin-services-as-vat-exempt/
Bitcoin transactions are not VAT exempt in the UK where they are used for the exchange of services, it says that in your link. It is also confirmed by HMRC.
"However, in all instances, VAT will be due in the normal way from suppliers of any goods or services sold in exchange for Bitcoin or other similar cryptocurrency. The value of the supply of goods or services on which VAT is due will be the sterling value of the cryptocurrency at the point the transaction takes place".
Oh, sorry then, probably didn't read it properly, just got out of bed and didn't get my coffee yet.
It caught me out at first as well, but I pretty much knew that would be the case. If there was no way to exchange bitcoins for cash then it would have been fine, it's only because they have a cash value that VAT is applicable where you are supplying goods or services.
Just logged into my account at themeforest to be told I am going to charged VAT.
Could not find any info about payment gateway fees subtraction from the final amount that needs to be send via MOSS. paypal has like 6.9% fee on transactions (i have checked final 2 transactions, each had 6.9% in my case). Are we deducting this from the final MOSS payment amount?
Anyone seen any read on that?
Ask an accountant.
You already had to charge the tax of your country (or you were supposed to.)
as far as I know our european tax authorities: you owe them, you pay them.
how much the payment itself costs you is not their problem, but only yours... so nothing to deduct from the final amount.
btw: it seems a bit early to me, that you are already sending money to MOSS, isn't it?
afair you should do something like that soonest after end of this month...
like all VAT systems around here one probably should have to do this at a max of once in a month - or am I missing something out here?