General > General Technical Chat
Big Clive and Copper-Clad Wire
switchabl:
--- Quote from: soldar on October 22, 2023, 03:47:34 pm ---I am now retired but have spent most of my professional life in purchasing and these things can get quite convoluted. To give you an example, We sold in Spain, to the national phone company, products of an American company, made in China, delivered mostly in China (to be included in a pack), other times in Spain, and we paid to the American company in a bank in Singapore. I was in the middle of these contracts and negotiations and even for me it was complicated and we had tax consultants and accountants involved.
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I think this may explain at least part of your confusion. B2B is a whole different world than B2C and the latter has also changed a lot in the past decade or so. In B2B you have a lot of freedom in drafting your contracts. Once you start selling directly to consumers, countries tend to have pretty clear ideas on what you can or can not do. Just to give you an idea of what you can expect: https://www.s-ge.com/en/article/export-knowhow/20193-c3-e-commerce-legal-key-questions?ct
And yes, I get that they may not be able to enforce that in all cases. But that doesn't mean they think their rules don't apply to you and it doesn't mean that they are not going to try.
--- Quote from: soldar on October 22, 2023, 03:47:34 pm ---The notion that tax money would leave the country and return is just, to me, completely preposterous. I have not seen anything halfway convincing so far. Others can believe otherwise.
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I have already posted a link to a UK government site explaining their VAT rules for cross-border e-commerce.
As others have mentioned, there is a EU version. It is called IOSS:
https://vat-one-stop-shop.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2021-07/vatecommerceexplanatory_notes_28102020_en.pdf
It's a bit different from the UK one in that it is not mandatory (but encouraged) outside of the big platforms. You may need an intermediary in the EU if your country doesn't have an agreement with the EU. And if you don't use it, the buyer still pays VAT on delivery. The UK approach seems to be "we trust you to do this" which still seems very weird to me. They may not have been prepared/have the resources to create a full replacement for the planned EU system post-Brexit.
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