Il complesso equilibrio tra il regime IVA delle cessioni intracomunitarie, da una parte, e l’ulteriore impegno sinergico richiesto alle amministrazioni fiscali nazionali per il controllo delle stesse crea una situazione di difficoltà per coloro che operano in questo settore, generando elevati costi di adeguamento e spesso un inaccettabile alto grado di incertezza giuridica. Lo scritto analizza un caso di IVA nel settore delle cessioni di beni tra Stati membri che si rivela chiaramente appesantito da tale situazione. Appare difficile per operatori di buona fede applicare correttamente il regime IVA delle transazioni intracomunitarie in un settore del commercio che vede un incremento di frodi e attività criminali transnazionali. Tale situazione conduce ad un diniego del diritto di esenzione IVA per gli operatori di buona fede che acquistano beni e compromette, attraverso un effetto domino, altri diritti connessi all’IVA come quello del rimborso per persone non stabilite.

1. Introduction The European Economic Community [1] introduced the VAT system in 1968 [2], with the final long term aim of abolishing custom border controls and eliminating internal fiscal barriers. Fiscal borders for the trade of goods were definitely abolished within the EU in 1993 [3], with EU exports and imports becoming intra-EU supplies and intra-EU acquisitions of goods [4] and the adoption of a zero rate on intra-EU supplies of goods and application of VAT on intra-EU acquisitions of goods [5]. These transitional arrangements for intra-EU trade were introduced with Directive 91/680/EEC [6] [7] and current rules are part of the recast of the VAT Directive [8]. These measures had the essential aim of facilitating the free movement of goods within the EU. Specifically, the principle of taxation in the country of destination has been introduced for intra-EU supply of goods between taxable persons. Therefore, these operations are exempt from taxation in the country of origin and taxed in the country of destination [9]. Nevertheless, the applicability of the exemption regime is subject to the fulfillment of a number of formal conditions including the taxable persons involved producing the necessary documentation in support of the transactions [10]. The complex balance of the VAT regime for intra-EU trade on one hand and the additional synergistic work required of national tax administration to control intra-EU transactions on the other created a difficult situation for taxable persons working in the area, producing “high compliance costs” and more often than not “an unacceptably high level of legal uncertainty” [11]. In this paper, I discuss a VAT case in the area of intra-EU supply of goods which is clearly burdened with this “unacceptably high level of legal uncertainty”. I will provide both a “Law in Books” – detailing what is the applicable VAT treatment for the specific case – and a “Law in Action” – what are the consequences when said statutory law is applied to the empirical data – approach [12], under the lens of VAT law. I will try to evaluate how difficult it is for good faith business operators to apply the correct VAT regime to intra-EU transactions in an area of trade that sees an increase of frauds and transnational criminal activities [13], and document how this “unacceptably high level of legal uncertainty” not only often results in a denial of the right of exemption for good faith EU taxable person acquiring goods, or in a tax audit for good faith EU taxable persons selling the goods and failing to invoice properly, but also compromises through a domino effect other VAT rights such as that the right to a refund for non-established persons [14]. 2. Case study: a supply of movable goods between EU Member states The [continua..]