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Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

vatmossapi.com

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Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#21

Post by mherrmann »

vog wrote: post #19

While this is a great way for you to collect internal business numbers from other companies, I don't quite see how the benefit for those companies is so large that it warrants sending internal information to you. By the way, do you plan to provide statistical summaries of your findings? Such as: How many companies from country X works with what set of countries Y? How many invoices do they (approximately) file to whi…

No bookkeeping numbers are being sent at all? Unless you count a pair of countries and a post code (without any amounts or anything!!) as bookkeeping.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#22

Post by vog »

mherrmann wrote: post #21
vog wrote: post #19

While this is a great way for you to collect internal business numbers from other companies, I don't quite see how the benefit for those companies is so large that it warrants sending internal information to you. By the way, do you plan to provide statistical summaries of your findings? Such as: How many companies from country X works with what set of countries Y? How many invoices do they (approximately) file to whi…

No bookkeeping numbers are being sent at all? Unless you count a pair of countries and a post code (without any amounts or anything!!) as bookkeeping.

Sorry, this was a typo. I meant business information, not bookkeeping information.

> Unless you count a pair of countries and a post code

It is more than that. You also have the source IP address, which you can map not only to countries, but to relatively small regions and sometimes to individual companies.

If this service was meant to be "datensparsam", it would provide an updated table or dataset, and not require a single request for every small bit of information.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#23

Post by Silhouette »

timvdalen wrote: post #5
wayn3 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VAT is technically paid by the customer, you just collect them to make the process slightly less ridiculous. therefore, VAT is paid based on customer location. this does not mean that you dont have to pay VAT at all if you sell to germany. in that case, you ahve to pay german VAT. if youre smalltime enough, its likely that nobody will go after you, but thats what it is.

Correct, but you're not required to pay the local (Dutch) VAT, so the seller doesn't have to collect it. This tool shows the Dutch VAT rate (0.21) for all buyer countries, which is not correct in that case.

Please stop spreading misinformation. The place of supply rules for digital sales changed at the start of 2015, and you very much are required to charge VAT, at the appropriate rate, on cross border digital sales within the EU. The API we're discussing is presumably intended to make it easier to figure out what the appropriate rate is for any given sale, because the administrative overhead with the new scheme is significant.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#24

Post by mherrmann »

Silhouette wrote: post #15

The EU administration itself or the national tax authorities in the EU should have provided an official service like this to go with the VAT changes for digital sales from day one. I appreciate someone else stepping up and doing it, though I'd want to see more information about the source(s) they were using for the data and how frequently they were checked before I'd hook a real business up to a third party service l…

The source is mentioned at the bottom of the page. Please read the full page before criticising.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#25

Post by Silhouette »

jacquesm wrote: post #12

This does not make the distinction between consumers and corporate (VAT registered) customers nor does it make a distinction between services and goods (and various classes of goods, to make things even more complicated). Which makes me suspect this is a very broken implementation and you should not rely on it for your business needs.

Given that it's specifically for VAT MOSS, presumably it's specifically intended for B2C sales of digital products/services where the MOSS-related place of supply rules apply?

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#26

Post by mherrmann »

kk_cz wrote: post #11

How about different rates for different goods / services? This looks like a gross oversimplification. Doing VAT correctly is quite hard - there is a reason why there are dedicated VAT specialists working in larger consulting firms.

It's only for digital goods/services.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#27

Post by mherrmann »

vog wrote: post #22
mherrmann wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No bookkeeping numbers are being sent at all? Unless you count a pair of countries and a post code (without any amounts or anything!!) as bookkeeping.

Sorry, this was a typo. I meant business information, not bookkeeping information. > Unless you count a pair of countries and a post code It is more than that. You also have the source IP address, which you can map not only to countries, but to relatively small regions and sometimes to individual companies. If this service was meant to be "datensparsam", it would provide an updated table or dataset, and not require a…

Oh come on, how is that sensitive. Use a proxy if you're really worried about this.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#28

Post by mherrmann »

Silhouette wrote: post #25
jacquesm wrote: post #12

This does not make the distinction between consumers and corporate (VAT registered) customers nor does it make a distinction between services and goods (and various classes of goods, to make things even more complicated). Which makes me suspect this is a very broken implementation and you should not rely on it for your business needs.

Given that it's specifically for VAT MOSS, presumably it's specifically intended for B2C sales of digital products/services where the MOSS-related place of supply rules apply?

Yes. Exactly.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#29

Post by Silhouette »

talideon wrote: post #16

That won't work in Ireland. While 23% is the headline rate, it's not the only rate: https://www.taxworld.ie/vat/summary/vat-rates/

There are variable rates almost everywhere, but this API is specifically about digital sales (where the MOSS system applies) so it will typically be that headline rate that you need anyway.

Of course, there's no guarantee that that will always be the case, and to know for sure you need to understand the tax systems of 28 different EU member states. This is (one of many reasons) why the new EU VAT rules have been so controversial: the burden for reliable, full compliance is ridiculous.

Re: Show HN: A REST API for Calculating VAT in the EU

#30

Post by jacquesm »

mherrmann wrote: post #20
jacquesm wrote: post #12

This does not make the distinction between consumers and corporate (VAT registered) customers nor does it make a distinction between services and goods (and various classes of goods, to make things even more complicated). Which makes me suspect this is a very broken implementation and you should not rely on it for your business needs.

It is only for calculating tax when selling to consumers.

It's rare to find a business that only sells to consumers.

You really should make the limitations and the targeted audience for the service absolutely clear or you're going to create a world of hurt for the people that use your service thinking you are solving a problem for them.

Essentially you are giving tax advice, that's not an arena you should walk into without professional guidance to make sure you get this 100% right, both from a liability perspective as well as from the perspective of your customers who will come to rely on it (and who won't be able to point at you if you get something wrong).

Things you need (at a minimum):

- the date of the transaction (in case a transaction is processed for a date in the past or the future rather than at the moment of the API call when the rates were different than they are today)

- a means to update VAT rates exactly when they are changed in real life (typically: a system that remembers the VAT rates historically)

- a way to identify the nature of the customers (business / private individuals)

- a way to identify the nature of the product sold (goods, services, a combination of both, and what kind of goods)

- a data privacy statement (you're dealing with consumer data if the API is called from within a webpage running on the consumers browser)

And whatever else I've forgotten but which your local VAT/tax consultant should be able to answer.

You are taking care of one very simple case which the VATMOSS portal in a way already handles without clearly delineating what that case is and which cases you explicitly don't handle.

The easiest improvement to the site would be to include a large font line at the top stating this limitation.

"This tool is only to calculate VAT when selling services or digital goods to consumers"

Also, I think part of what throws people off about what the intended use case is is that you ask for the zip of consumer and country of origin of seller, which does not matter for VATMOSS, it is the country the consumer is in that determines the rate so you don't actually need the country of origin for services/digital goods as far as I know.

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