Maybe you should consider B2B like FastSpring. They have fair rates and they will do all the ‘hard work’ for you.
Oeps, wrong again. In Belgium you need to have a VAT number when you sell more then 700eur/year. 
BTW If I am not mistaken Belgium has the largest tax rates of Europe.
For example if you have earned 1000eur/month (without collected VAT) you have to first pay a 20.5% social security rate. Then you need to pay up to 50% taxes (depending on the business model). So for every 1000eur, I have about 400eur netto left.
[quote=146617:@Christoph De Vocht]Are you saying you do not have a VAT number? So basically you are selling illegal (as we call it ‘black sales’).
If you are selling software, you have to do it legally (read: have a VAT number).[/quote]
In France, under 32900 the Autoentrepreneur (individual doing business) is free of VAT for services. But social taxes (health and retirement) are about 30 % of the gross sales.
Whichever way it goes, either I suddenly lose on average an extra 20pc of my revenue, or my prices go up.
(And don’t forget they tax the sole trader on the profit too. That could be 45pc of profit. Plus self employed national insurance too)
This new legislation completely removes the uk 81k vat threshold at a stroke. That’s the main issue.
Physical sales, 81k
Software or documents sold as a download, 0k
If the customer pays online and receive a cd with software on it by post, is it still considered a downloadable software ? if not, are we going to sell software on CDs again like in the 90s ?
selling on cd looks like the only way around this to me, because that isn’t considered to be digital services with ‘minimal intervention’
If manually sending an email with a link and serial number gets around it, even better (less bad…), but as with all things tax, no two advisors agree.
By the time you factor in the cost of CDs / DVDs, packaging, postage etc - it would probably be easier to sell on the MAS (if you sell OS X software that is).
Nope. Selling in mas requires sand boxing and that’s a whole extra bundle of pain.
Even if I was inclined, it’s not possible by January.
Hey, Jeff … how about moving to the USA? That’ll solve your problem and you still have 34 days left to do it. ^^
Brilliant!
I should warn you though, even though we don’t have “VAT” we have “Democrats” … spelled different but woven from the same cloth ^^
[quote=146636:@Jeff Tullin]Nope. Selling in mas requires sand boxing and that’s a whole extra bundle of pain.
Even if I was inclined, it’s not possible by January.[/quote]
A couple days with App Wrapper. Easy as pie …
Guys - I’ve pretty much left the forums but stumbled on this via a link someone sent me.
Talk to an accountant, that’s what they are there for. I’m not going to go into details as that would mean talking about my tax affairs + I’m not an accountant.
There are things you can do (legally!!!).
As an example, in the UK you may be better off in the UK Flat Rate Scheme. In effect you sign up to the scheme if your VAT turnover is less than £150k (exc VAT) you then give the taxman 14.5% VAT, the rate varies depending on the type of industry your in, and you pocket the remaining 5.5% yourself. Won’t take all the pain out of matters but it is one option amongst a few.
Get proper advice from a qualified professional!
[quote=146607:@Richard Summers]Personally I’m fine with only selling my apps through the MAS and paying my 30%. At least I do not have the hassle of all the extra paperwork.
This does however, have a wider impact on businesses, as I can foresee many smaller companies refusing to do business with EU countries, and only dealing with countries outside the EU, such as with the US.[/quote]
Richard, this is why we need a referendum in the UK to get out of the EU. It is so damaging to the UK and anyone who cant see that is delusional. I don’t think UKIP are the answer next year but they certainly have the right idea. Our post recession growth is the best in the EU so what happens, the UK gets hit with a huge EU bill which good old Cameron says he won’t pay, ha he won’t have any choice. We need to get out of the EU before it completely wrecks what is left of what was a fantastic country and somewhere to be proud of living. The EU is a nice idea but it’s member states are from such diverse economic climates it simply does not work. Not only that the UK is renown for abiding by rules that we are the only member state to fully take on board some of the red tape bureaucracy which is destroying us while other EU states overlook it.
Just my 2p worth.
Well, not quite as simple. I’ve been following some threads on other forums and it appears that a non-EU supplier selling services to a EU customer should be collecting VAT. (http://www2.deloitte.com/global/en/pages/tax/articles/eu-2015-place-of-supply-changes-overview-of-new-rules.html) I did read that FastSpring is capable of handling this etc.
How this will be enforced no one knows yet. US supplier on US servers selling product to EU customer…
Nonsense. Get real, street advice from a bloke in the pub who swears blind “they can’t touch ya for it!”.
There’s no better place…
I think you take it wrongly.
Just keep you price of your app the same. But add x% VAT for EU customers. Thats what most do.
For example my app is priced at 18 - I also put this price on our website. I do mention EU customers needs to add VAT.
So basically, in my case, the customer goes to Paypal and Paypal will add VAT or not (depending he is a EU customer or not).
But there is a catch (there alway is).
If the EU customers has a VAT number (read: company) they do not have to pay the VAT. So make sure you have this covered as well.
Of course this means you have to return the collected VAT to the MOSS centre. So it will take some extra admin time.
Every NON-EU seller needs to add VAT for EU customers. That is always been the case, and will be the case from 1/1/2015
And yes, Fastspring does this for you which is convenient when you do not want the extra administration for doing this yourself.
Same arguments the Scots had
It has some pros and cons. But UK leaving EU is very probably not going to happen any time soon.