Printeers
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Do I have to pay VAT?

We are based in the Netherlands and work with partners anywhere in the world. All our prices are always excluding VAT. VAT is applied per invoice line: products, shipping, return shipping and packaging follow the country your order shipped to; warehousing and, for a business, subscriptions follow where your business is established. A private individual pays the VAT of their own country on subscriptions.

Declare your billing account

Every billing account declares whether it belongs to a private individual or a business. VAT is applied based on that declaration and the burden of a correct declaration is on you. A business records its business registration number once and registers its VAT ID on the billing account. Our support team verifies every VAT ID, an EU VAT ID with the VIES register. A business in the EU that is not registered for VAT declares that instead (see "Not registered for VAT" below). A business in the EU registers the VAT ID of the country of its billing address first, and keeps it as long as it holds other VAT IDs. While that VAT ID is not yet verified, we hold the week's invoice and contact you; a business that registered no VAT ID at all is invoiced as a business without a usable VAT ID (below). Validate your VAT ID

The country of a shipment is its VAT territory: Northern Ireland (BT postcodes) counts as an EU country for goods, Monaco as France, and the territories listed under goods shipped outside the EU count as outside the EU despite their country.

Goods shipped to the Netherlands

You pay 21% Dutch VAT. Businesses with a Dutch VAT ID reclaim it in their Dutch VAT return.

Goods shipped to another EU country

  • You hold a verified VAT ID of the destination country: 0% as an intra-Community supply, invoiced under that VAT ID.
  • You hold a Dutch VAT ID (but not one of the destination): 21% Dutch VAT, reclaimable in your Dutch VAT return.
  • You hold a verified EU VAT ID of another country, and no Dutch one: 0% as an intra-Community supply under that ID; you declare the acquisition in the destination country yourself, and if you do not, the acquisition is also taxable in the country of that ID (Art. 41 VAT Directive).
  • You are a private individual without a VAT ID: the VAT rate of the destination country.
  • You declared that your EU business is not registered for VAT: the VAT rate of the destination country, as for a private individual.
  • You declared a business and none of your EU VAT IDs is verified yet: 21% Dutch VAT until one is. A business in the EU has its invoice held instead until the VAT ID of its billing address country is verified (see above). Without an EU VAT ID and without the declaration, orders to EU addresses are rejected (see "Shipping into the EU" below).

Goods shipped outside the EU

0%, as an export, regardless of your VAT status. This includes the parts of EU countries outside the EU VAT area: the Canary Islands, Ceuta and Melilla (Spain), Åland (Finland), Heligoland and Büsingen (Germany), Livigno and Campione d'Italia (Italy) and Mount Athos (Greece).

Warehousing and subscriptions

These follow the country of your billing address. A billing address in Monaco counts as France, and one in the territories listed under goods shipped outside the EU counts as outside the EU here too.

  • Established in the Netherlands: 21% Dutch VAT.
  • Established in another EU country with a verified VAT ID of that country: 0%, VAT reverse-charged to you.
  • Established outside the EU as a business with a usable VAT ID: no VAT, the service is outside the scope of EU VAT.
  • A business without a verified VAT ID, including one that declared it is not registered for VAT: 21% Dutch VAT. A business in the EU whose VAT ID waits for verification has its invoice held instead (see above).
  • Private individual, warehousing: 21% Dutch VAT.
  • Private individual, subscriptions: the VAT of your own country, the country of your invoice address. Outside the EU no EU VAT applies.

Not registered for VAT

A business in the EU without a VAT ID declares, on its billing account, that it is not subject to VAT on purchases of goods from other EU countries in the country where it is established: it stays below the EUR 10,000 acquisition threshold and has not opted to pay VAT on these acquisitions. Four groups are in this position: exempt small businesses (KOR or its national equivalent), businesses with only VAT-exempt activities, flat-rate farmers, and non-taxable legal persons such as some non-profits. The declaration is recorded once, with the date and the text you accepted.

With the declaration, goods are invoiced like those of a private individual: 21% Dutch VAT within the Netherlands, the VAT rate of the destination country elsewhere in the EU, and 0% outside the EU. Warehousing and subscriptions are invoiced with 21% Dutch VAT. For a business established in another EU country, buying these services from us obliges it to register for VAT in its own country, and with that VAT ID they are reverse-charged.

When you sell the goods on to consumers in other EU countries, those sales are domestic supplies in the country the goods arrive in: you need a VAT registration there or the EU scheme for small businesses. As soon as your business is registered for VAT, add the VAT ID to the billing account.

Business accounts in the EU created before the declaration existed and without a VAT ID are asked in the Dashboard to add the VAT ID of their country or make the declaration; until then their orders to EU addresses are rejected.

Shipping into the EU

An order to an address in the EU is accepted for a billing account that holds an EU VAT ID, belongs to a private individual, or carries the declaration above. A business established outside the EU needs an EU VAT ID to ship into the EU; without one the order is rejected.

What registering a VAT ID changes

Which VAT ID you register changes how your shipments to other EU countries are invoiced:

  • A VAT ID of a destination country: shipments to that country are zero-rated under that ID.
  • A VAT ID of another EU country, and no Dutch VAT ID: EU shipments to countries where you hold no VAT ID are zero-rated under it. The acquisition declaration in the destination country is yours, and so is the Art. 41 exposure when it is not made.
  • A Dutch VAT ID: EU shipments to countries where you hold no VAT ID get 21% Dutch VAT, which you reclaim in your Dutch VAT return. This applies even when you also hold VAT IDs of other EU countries.

A change applies from the next weekly invoice, for the whole week; invoices already issued do not change.

Several VAT IDs

You can register one VAT ID per VAT prefix; Great Britain (GB) and Northern Ireland (XI) count as two. Add or stop using a VAT ID on the billing account page: before an EU VAT ID is added, the Dashboard shows what it changes on your invoices, and by adding it you agree to that. A VAT ID of another company does not belong on your billing account; create a billing account for that company in your group. A VAT ID you stop using stays on the invoices already issued under it. Each week you receive one invoice per VAT ID that applied, or one invoice without a VAT ID when none applied, grouped in one statement that you pay in one amount; see find your invoices and statements. Every invoice states the VAT ID it was issued under, when there is one, and the legally required mention for its treatment.