The European Commission proposes standard VAT declaration
2013-10-25
The European Commission published its proposal for a Council directive amending Directive 2006/112/EC on the common system of value added tax as regards a standard VAT return.
The context of the proposal is that the VAT system requires businesses to complete periodic VAT returns which can be especially complex when submitting VAT returns in different Member States. The complexity is the result of providing different information, the information not having harmonised definitions, the lack of good common guidance, different rules and procedures for the submission and corrections, and needing to use the national language.
To address these problems the Commission sought stakeholder views on a standard VAT declaration through the consultation on the Green Paper on the Future of VAT. Positive replies from stakeholders led the Commission to include in the Communication on the Future of VAT a commitment to come forward with a proposal for a standard VAT declaration before the end of 2013, which is now completed by the present proposal.
By accepting the present proposal, the Member States will have to implement the new regulations by 31st December 2016 at the latest.