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Business to Business TVA in France


Richardk
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I'm looking for a link to some offical infornation on how to handle TVA between 2 French (TVA) registered business' based and operating in France. Does anyone have any ideas? I've spent a little time looking around but to no avail so far.

I believe that the TVA must be paid at the time of purchase as opposed to simply swapping VAT numbers as 2 UK VAT registered businesses would do for example. This does seem a little strange though when the rest of Europe (to my knowledge) operates as per the UK system.

Thanks in advance,

Richard

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Thanks for that, however, I've already had a look through the site. If someone is aware of an actual web site page / document that would help. It's easy to find generic info on the charging of TVA, however, I've had more trouble regarding the specifics of charging a fellow French registered business.  All help appreciated....!

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[quote user="Richardk"]
I believe that the TVA must be paid at the time of purchase as opposed to simply swapping VAT numbers as 2 UK VAT registered businesses would do for example.
[/quote]

I recently de-registered for UK VAT. Before that all my UK business clients paid the VAT due along with the rest of the bill. Similarly I paid VAT on supplies. In other words the French and UK systems work the same.

The only time I've heard of "swapping VAT numbers" has been for cross-border transactions.

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[quote user="Richardk"]This does seem a little strange though when the rest of Europe (to my knowledge) operates as per the UK system.

[/quote]

I believe the rest of Europe does operate as per the UK system, i.e. VAT is charged on all invoices. I don't actually think there is any choice.

I do know that in Spain, all invoices have VAT charged on them, whether or not the customer or supplier is VAT registered, except those to and from businesses outside the country.

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Ahh....so I'm wrong in my thinking on how the UK works...in which case the as you say it seems that both the French, Spanish UK systems (& presumably all EU countries) work the same whereby locally everyone pays VAT whether tax registered or not. It's simply that those who are tax registered can claim the tax element back.

Unfortunately I still need to find some official info to state this as I need to it to illustrate to a German s/w company where thy need to make some changes to some billing s/w we're starting to use!

Any ideas on references anyone? English, German or French sources are good.

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As far as I know, businesses are not obliged to invoice without VAT for goods they sell to businesses in other EU countries.

Doing so creates a necessity for them to submit yet more VAT forms, e.g. Periodic "Intercommunal" statistical documents; some companies, specially smaller ones who do not regularly export, do not want the extra work this creates.

VAT paid on such transactions can be reclaimed, but I believe that the procedure for this varies from country to country. It was a bit of a hassle in Spain.

I often did not bother to reclaim VAT we paid on small invoices, but the system may by now have changed from what I had to deal with.

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The German system should be standard; basically the same as here, so the s/w should be correct if the provider knows how his own system works. I never had billing/VAT problems with any German suppliers.

Just think of the most convoluted, bureaucratic and complicated system you can imagine, and you'll be pretty close [:D]

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