VAT (Umsatzsteuer) Tax .. I need help

BigDave

Hey guys. I need your help.
Luckily and unluckily I made enough money through my apps last year, which means I will now be seen tax wise not longer as "klein unternehmen".
And I have to make every 4 months " Umsatzsteuer Voranmeldung".

For this I now finally got a professional tax person hired to help me with it.
But she request me to get the Umsatzsteuer(ust) for all my revenue sources like.

Apple
Google Play
Amazon
Chartboost

Where do I get the UST number of each from. I never got a proper bill of any of them.
They just transfer money to my account.

PS: I am located in Berlin Germany so EU

imjustmike

From what I recall, with Apple as you technically don't sell to your users, but you sell to Apple who then sells to the user (and takes care of all the compliance) so that should be zero rated. With Android you sell directly to the customer so need to collect VAT on each sale. That's certainly how it was when I looked last year.

BigDave

@imjustmike
i think google now also has the same system as apple.

Starting January 1, 2015, due to a change in Value-Added Tax (VAT) laws in the European Union (EU), Google will be responsible for determining, charging, and remitting VAT for all Google Play Store digital content purchases for EU customers. Google will send VAT for EU customers' app purchases to the appropriate authority.

BigDave

So since Appstore take care about it.
And Ad revenue has no VAT.

Where does that leave me with my Umsatzsteuer Erklärung.
It sounds like I would pay my tax lady for nothing.

Hopscotch

Hi @BigDave

you are correct in that Google now does it the same as Apple.

You still have to hand in a "Umsatzsteuer Erklärung", even if VAT is zero rated. So you do need your tax lady.

Make sure you differentiate which payments come from where. E.g. Amazon payments come separately from each regional store, thus have different VAT numbers.

The applicable VAT numbers should be in the payment notification email you receive. Unlike Germany, most international companies are not required (and understandably prefer not to) to have detailed contact and VAT info public on the web.

imjustmike

You're absolutely right - I just did some reading (turns out last time I read up on this was longer than 1 year ago, time flies!), Google now handles compliance so you don't need to worry about that.

In that case, I believe you can zero rate VAT since it is included in the price of the app already. I'll try to do some more reading on this and find out for sure as it's not exactly clear online.

BigDave

@imjustmike @Hopscotch
Yes I thought so unluckily amazon has to handle it differently.

Thanks guys

I just talked with another indie dev here in Germany and he meant that none of my revenue is from within Germany and there for is UStG wise tax none relative. This how he is doing it since 2012. Writing down the "Kosten Überschuss Rechnung" "davon nicht steuerbare Umsätze i.S. des UStG „ Full amount EUR. "

As he relies on this:

Zunächst heißt es im Umsatzsteuergesetz, dass die deutsche Umsatzsteuer nur zu erheben ist für "Umsätze, die ein Unternehmer im Inland ... ausführt". Klingt einfach, ist aber kompliziert. Denn wo wird der Umsatz ausgeführt, wenn ich (in meinem Büro in Deutschland) einen Roman übersetze, der in einem Verlag mit Sitz in Paris erscheinen soll? Die erstaunliche Antwort heißt: Der Umsatz wird in Frankreich ausgeführt und ist deshalb in Deutschland nicht steuerbar.

http://www.goetzbuchholz.de/UStAuslandi.htm

And he told me to write a letter to the Finanzamt challenging the fact that I am not longer a "Kleinunternehmer". As all my money comes from other countries.

Do you think that sounds reasonable?

Hopscotch

@BigDave,

if your real income (regardless where it comes from) is above the threshold, the will no longer treat you as a "kleinunternehmer".

What you are able to get through, is to change the frequency with which you have to hand in your "Umsatzsteuer Voranmeldung". You can get this changed to quarterly or even yearly only.

BigDave

@Hopscotch ok I see.
Alright! Its quarterly right now. And I should have give them the first report 1 month ago. But the letter came 2 days ago. So I guess its something to do next week earliest.

So I can list all revenue of apple and google + chartboost ads
as 0 Vat. Using the UST/Vat of the Abrechnungsstelle like

Apple
iTunes s.à r. l.
8 rue Heinrich Heine
L-1720 Luxembourg
TVA/VAT No.: LU20165772

And Amazon also with 0 Vat but having different Ust/Vat numbers based on where each single the sale happened. (btw this makes me considering to kill my amazon account)

Right?

Hopscotch

That is correct @BigDave

BigDave

@Hopscotch danke dir!

BigDave

VAT ID
(my location EU BERLIN GERMANY)
(for future people that are looking for it)

Apple
iTunes s.à r. l.
8 rue Heinrich Heine
L-1720 Luxembourg
TVA/VAT No.: LU20165772

Google Ireland
Gordon House
Barrow Street
Dublin 4
Ireland
VAT number (IE6388047V)

BigDave

I am still searching to figure out the VAT ID for chartboost and
Amazon VAT ID's. I do not find this process transparent at all. Spending our of re-search already and trying to get answer from them directly.

Chartboost
420 Taylor Street
San Francisco
CA 94102
USA
VAT = ???

Amazon
COM VAT ???
LUX.UK VAT ??
LUX.DE VAT ??

BigDave

Also to have the tax relevant bills they have to be created and theoretically (they will not care about it so why sending it) being sent to Apple,Google, Chartboost and Amazon. Applying the "reverse charge" principle.

reverse charge=
"Die Umsatzsteuer ist vom Leistungsempfänger anzumelden und
abzuführen.""

freneticz

Are you sure about Amazon, sounds crazy

BigDave

@freneticz
I trust in @Hopscotch
it also sounds write as on my bank account it comes from 3 different locations.
COM VAT ???
LUX.UK VAT ??
LUX.DE VAT ??
So far I couldn't find a single VAT of amazon still waiting for their response.

Hopscotch

@BigDave

here the info for Amazon Europe:

Amazon Europe Core Sarl
5 Rue Plaetis
L-2338 Luxembourg
Luxembourg

Tax ID : LU26375245

For US payments we actually do not need the Tax ID.

To make things simple for the Tax office, we create a proforma invoices for the stores ourselves for the payments, indicating reverse change. On the proforma invoices for payments from within europe we include the stores Tax ID. For payments from abroad we leave them out.

BigDave

thanks @Hopscotch
they also responded now

_Thank you for writing in. You can use the following information for your records:

Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
5 Rue Plaetis, L-2338 Luxembourg, Luxembourg
VAT Registration Number: LU 20944528

AMAZON DIGITAL SERVICES INC
PO BOX 80683
SEATTLE, WA 98108-0683

All royalty invoices from developers can be sent via email to digital-royalties-invoices@amazon.com_

BigDave

ok thanks so this is solved than. As for Chartboost I might get a VAT soon too I will also post it here. Thanks everyone to solve this rather uninteresting problem too.

BigDave

for completion:

Chartboost Inc.
420 Taylor St
San Francisco, CA 94102
Tax ID # 45-1065743