Place of an intra-Community acquisition of goods EU VAT case law

6 cases of the Court of Justice and the General Court of the European Union on this point of VAT law, from 2010 to 2026.

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Provisions these cases interpret most

Article 41 of Directive 2006/112/EC Place of an intra-Community acquisition of goods · 3 of these cases
Article 42 of Directive 2006/112/EC Place of an intra-Community acquisition of goods · 3 of these cases
Article 141 of Directive 2006/112/EC Exemptions for intra-Community acquisitions of goods · 3 of these cases
Article 40 of Directive 2006/112/EC Place of an intra-Community acquisition of goods · 1 of these cases
Article 203 of Directive 2006/112/EC Persons liable for payment of VAT to the tax authorities · 1 of these cases
Article 197 of Directive 2006/112/EC Persons liable for payment of VAT to the tax authorities · 1 of these cases
Article 226 of Directive 2006/112/EC Content of invoices · 1 of these cases
Article 265 of Directive 2006/112/EC Recapitulative statements · 1 of these cases

The 6 cases, most recent first

Under each case, what the Court decided, from its summary. The summaries are AI-generated and are not official documents: open the case for the Court’s own text.

T-638/24 Finanzamt Österreich (Intra-Community acquisition and supply – double taxation)

Judgment · 25 February 2026 · Austria

Article 41 taxation of intra-Community acquisitions alongside liability for VAT wrongly shown on the invoice

They do not preclude it. Articles 41 and 203 have distinct conditions and purposes and may apply simultaneously. The Dyrektor Izby Skarbowej w W. case is distinguished because there the supply had been definitively treated as non-exempt and taxed, whereas an Article 203 liability arises from the invoice alone, not from taxation of the supply, and can in principle be corrected. The second question was not examined. Businesses that quote the departure Member State's VAT number on cross-border purchases can face acquisition tax there under Article 41 even where the supplier has also been made liable for VAT wrongly shown on the invoice. Relevant to periods before Directive 2018/1910.

T-646/24 MS KLJUČAROVCI

Judgment · 3 December 2025 · Slovenia

Triangular simplification in a four party chain, and fraud

Article 141(c) does not require the person to whom the subsequent supply is made to take physical possession or receipt. Transport to that person's own customer in the same Member State does not prevent the condition being met, and the intermediary's knowledge of the onward supply is irrelevant, transactions being taxed on their objective characteristics. However, the authorities and courts of the Member State of identification must refuse both the Article 42 and 141 scheme and the second paragraph of Article 41 reduction where the acquirer knew or should have known it was participating in fraud in the chain. Useful for traders and advisers structuring chain transactions.

C-247/21 Luxury Trust Automobil

Judgment · 8 December 2022 · Austria

Invoice wording as a condition of the triangulation simplification

No valid designation: in a triangular transaction the words "Reverse charge" under Article 226(11a) cannot be replaced by another form of wording, however informative. Nor can the omission be cured retrospectively. Adding the reference later is the first issue of the required invoice and has no retroactive effect, because designation of the customer as liable is a substantive condition of Article 42(a), not a formality. The Article 219a question therefore did not need answering. In any event these requirements cannot vary between Member States. Anyone using the Article 141 simplification must put "Reverse charge" on the invoice at the outset.

C-696/20 Dyrektor Izby Skarbowej w W. (Incorrect classification of chain transactions)

Judgment · 7 July 2022 · Poland

Article 41 safety net where a chain transaction is misclassified

Article 41 applies even where the Member State of identification is the Member State of departure, and taxation there is not excluded merely because the customers taxed the separate later transaction at destination. It does, however, preclude such taxation where the intra-Community supply giving rise to the acquisition has not been treated as exempt in that Member State. Taxing both breaches proportionality and neutrality, and no risk of avoidance arises.

C-580/16 Firma Hans Bühler

Judgment · 19 April 2018 · Austria

Triangulation simplification, identification in the dispatch Member State and late recapitulative statements

Article 141(c) is met because only the VAT number under which the intermediary made the acquisition matters, so establishment and identification in the dispatch Member State do not block the simplification. Late filing of the recapitulative statement is a formal failure and cannot alone trigger Article 41 where the substantive condition in Article 42(a) is met, nor need the number still be valid when the statement is filed. Refusal remains possible where the taxable person knowingly participated in evasion or the breach prevents proof of the substantive conditions. Intermediaries in ABC chains can rely on triangulation even where they hold a VAT number in the dispatch Member State, provided they use their other number for the acquisition.

C-536/08 X and fiscale eenheid Facet-Facet Trading

Judgment · 22 April 2010 · Netherlands

No deduction of VAT on a fallback intra-Community acquisition

No immediate right of deduction. Where the goods were not actually brought into the Member State of identification, the deemed acquisition cannot be regarded as giving rise to a right of deduction under Article 17, because the goods are not used for the taxable person's taxed transactions there. The remedy is the specific corrective mechanism in the second subparagraph of Article 28b(A)(2), reducing the taxable amount once the acquisition is shown to have been taxed in the Member State of arrival, not the general deduction regime. Confirms that the fallback taxation in the identification State is a sanction-like charge with no input credit.