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Defending a claim for German VAT to be paid by a UK company director
A personal tax client has a problem with the Mutual Assistance Recovery Directive (MARD). This allows the tax authorities in one EU member state to request another to collect tax debt on their behalf.
Our client was the director of a UK limited company that traded in sporting goods online. The business grew and expanded its operations into Europe while still based in the UK. In 2010 the business’s advisers realised that having exceeded the distance selling thresholds it needed to register for VAT in Germany which it did in 2011.
Unfortunately the business overstretched itself and went into liquidation in 2013.
The German authorities realised that the business should have been registered in 2010. Basing their figures on the Intrastat returns they raised the equivalent of an assessment for underpaid VAT of about £60 000.
One might think that this is the company’s...
