A value-added tax identification number or VAT identification number (VATIN) is an

identifier An identifier is a name that identifies (that is, labels the identity of) either a unique object or a unique ''class'' of objects, where the "object" or class may be an idea, person, physical countable object (or class thereof), or physical mass ...

used in many countries, including the countries of the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

, for

value-added tax A value-added tax (VAT or goods and services tax (GST), general consumption tax (GCT)) is a consumption tax that is levied on the value added at each stage of a product's production and distribution. VAT is similar to, and is often compared wi ...

purposes. In the EU, a VAT identification number can be verified online at the EU's official VIES website. It confirms that the number is currently allocated and can provide the name or other identifying details of the entity to whom the identifier has been allocated. However, many national governments will not give out VAT identification numbers due to data protection laws.

Structure

The full identifier starts with an

ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 codes are two-letter country codes defined in ISO 3166-1, part of the ISO 3166 standard published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), to represent countries, dependent territories, and special ...

(2 letters) country code (except for Greece, which uses the ISO 639-1 language code ''EL'' for the Greek language, instead of its

country code ''GR'', and Northern Ireland, which uses the code ''XI'' when trading with the EU) and then has between 2 and 13 characters. The identifiers are composed of numeric digits in most countries, but in some countries they may contain letters. Foreign companies that trade with private individuals and non-business organisations in the EU may have a VATIN starting with "EU" instead of a country code, e.g.

Godaddy GoDaddy Inc. is an American publicly traded Internet Domain name registry, domain registry, Domain name registrar, domain registrar and web hosting company headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and incorporated in Delaware. GoDaddy is the world's fif ...

EU826010755 and Amazon ( AWS) EU826009064.

EU requirements

From 1 January 2020, the valid VAT number of the customer is a material requirement to be able to apply the zero VAT rate for intra-Community supplies of goods in the EU. If the customer's VAT number is not valid, 0% VAT rate cannot be applied. Companies must make sure that the VAT numbers of their customers are checked. You should always verify that the VAT number is valid in each corresponding country's tax system, as giving false IDs is considered a form of fraud. For small companies below a certain turn over threshold, the company itself can choose to not separately invoice and report VAT. In case a company chooses to not report VAT, the VAT-Number needs to contain the letters "EX" either in the number or as a suffix.https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/DE/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32020L0285

VAT numbers by country

European Union VAT identification numbers

VAT numbers of non-EU countries

VAT numbers of Latin American countries

References

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External links

VIES
European "VAT Information Exchange System". Taxation in the European Union Value added taxes Company identification numbers Taxpayer identification numbers