Tag Archives: telecoms

EU: Mini one stop shop (MOSS) regulation for ebusinesses adopted

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The Council Regulation (EU) No 967/2012 laying down rules on the application of the provisions of the VAT Directive concerning special schemes for taxable persons supplying telecommunications services, broadcasting services or electronic services to non-taxable persons (i.e. B2C) has been published.

The Regulation amends Council Implementing Regulation (EU) No 282/2011 and introduces new measures covering both “mini one stop shop” special schemes for EU and non-EU ebusinesses to be applied as from 1 January 2015.

For additional information you can access the Minutes of the Council (page 13) and text of the proposal.

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Germany implements Lebara decision on prepaid telecom cards

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On 24 September 2012 the German Ministry of Finance issued a decree  (only available in German language) implementing the principles of the ECJ decision in the “Lebara” case. You can read more of this case here, here and here.

Each sale of single purpose prepaid cards is regarded as a telecommunication service if these cards are sold in the supplier’s own name. Otherwise, if the sale is made in the name of a third person, an intermediary service is on hand. Whether there is a telecommunication service or an intermediary service should be considered on each distribution level.

A single purpose prepaid card in the sense of the decree requires that it can exclusively be used for telephone calls by means of the provided infrastructure, and that it contains all information necessary to make calls.

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EU: VAT reporting rules for telecommunications, broadcasting and eservices mini one stop shop scheme

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The Implementing Regulation No 815/2012 defining the VAT reporting rules for the mini one stop shop scheme (“MOSS”) for B2C telecommunication, broadcasting and eservices in the EU has been made officially available.
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Hungary: Tax on telecoms services

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In Hungary, under the Act on Telecommunications Tax, telecom companies are subject to a new tax calculated on the basis of phone calls initiated and messages (SMS, MMS) sent by their subscribers. The new act took effect on 1 July 2012. The tax is payable by the service providers and the tax base is calculated on the basis of the total time of calls initiated and the number of messages sent from the call number of the subscriber, or, in the absence of a subscription, the call number registered at the service provider. The tax rates are HUF 2 per minute started for initiated phone calls and HUF 2 per message sent.
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EU: Advocate General supportive of taxpayer in the Lebara ECJ case

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The Advocate General has given his opinion in the UK case of Lebara Ltd (C-520/10) at European Court of Justice (ECJ) concerning the supply of phone cards to distributors in other EU-States, which end users belonging in that same EU-State can redeem in return for receiving telecoms services (previously reported here). In summary, the Advocate General has suggested that the distributor, and not the card issuer (in this case Lebara) should be liable for the VAT due on the supply of telecoms services to end users. The reasons for this are that the distributor is either acting as an undisclosed agent of the card issuer or, in the alternative, because the card issuer makes a single supply of telecoms services to the distributor and the distributor in turn makes a supply to the end user.
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EU: ECJ hears phone cards case Lebara (C-520/10)

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In its submission to the hearing, the European Commission adopted the approach favored by Lebara Ltd, suggesting that in such circumstances the supply by the TelCo (i.e. the card issuer) is liable to reverse charge VAT in the distributor’s country, and that the onward supply by the distributor to the end user is subject to local VAT in the Member State where the distributor is established. Find out more →