Electronic publications: Council adopts reform allowing reduced VAT rates

On 6 November 2018, the Council adopted a directive allowing alignment of VAT rules for electronic and physical publications. From now on, member states will be able to apply reduced, super-reduced or zero VAT rates also to electronic publications.

The adoption of the e-publication directive follows the political agreement reached by the Council on 2 October. It opens up the possibility for member states to implement reduced VAT rates in their national law if they wish to do so.

Under the current VAT rules (directive 2006/112/EC), electronically supplied services are taxed at the standard VAT rate, i.e. minimum 15%, whereas publications on a physical support may benefit from non-standard rates.