Report from the Commission to the Council on the application of Article 263 (1) of Council Directive 2006/112/EC concerning the reduction of timeframes

In accordance with Article 2 of Council Directive 2008/117/EC of 16 December 2008 the Commission is required to present, on the basis of information provided by the Member States, and no later than 30 June 2011, a report assessing the impact of Article 263(1) of Directive 2006/112/EC on Member States' ability to fight against VAT fraud connected with intra‑Community supplies of goods and services as well as on the usefulness of the options provided for in Article 263(1a) to (1c), and, if necessary, to make appropriate proposals.

A first concern of Member States when confronted with fraudulent transactions was that the information contained in the recapitulative statements was available only after 6 months, which was far too late for risk analysis purposes. Therefore, the first initiative taken by the Commission in this field was to submit a proposal to amend the VAT Directive in order to reduce the timeframe for submitting and transmitting the recapitulative statement to 1 month.

The adoption of Directive 2008/117/EC of 16 December 2008 constituted an initial response to the request from the Member States to strengthen the VAT system and to assist them in their efforts to fight VAT fraud. This Directive amended Article 263(1) of Directive 2006/112/EC allowing for a reduction in the statutory time limits for the declaration of cross-border transactions for VAT purposes, together with a reduction in the time limits for the exchange of such information between Member States, so as to enable quicker detection of fraud, in particular as regards "VAT carousels".

In order to allow Member States some time to experience the functioning of the new provisions, the Commission decided to extend the deadline for submitting the report.

EUR-Lex: COM(2012)337: Follow the progress of this document through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2012:337:FIN

---