To be fair: Many companies do not respect that. I've also seen European based companies doing the same thing many times.
It's also a little frustrating (for small companies) if you sell across the whole EU single market (and also beyond like e.g. UK and many other countries) and have a very dynamic price frontend depending on user's country detection.
Btw. does anybody know if I can sell with fixed pricing for whole EU and cut my profit dynamically depending on user's country VAT rate? E.g. I charge 10 EUR for everyone in EU but I deduct 19% VAT in the backend for Germany, 21% for Spain etc. and basically make a little more profit with a German customer ?
> can sell with fixed pricing for whole EU and cut my profit dynamically depending on user's country VAT
Technically, yes - some selling platforms like Teachable give you that option. You (they) still have to break out the correct VAT on the inside and receipt to the customer, but this approach just lets you delay calculating VAT until after they've put in their country during the checkout process, while still keeping the same apparent price to the end user.
Sweet, thanks for the answer. Yes I know the right VAT has to be detected/chosen/calculated at the very end with right receipt but at least the more static frontend and more fixed charging does not violate EU laws.
"When you buy goods online in the EU, prices may vary from country to country or across different versions of the same website, for example due to differences in delivery costs. However, if you buy goods online WITHOUT cross-border delivery you should have access to the same prices and special offers as buyers living in that EU country"
So when cross-border delivery is done (this is fulfilled by electronic submitting even) I can charge different prices for different countries. All people with IP from country X get the same price. Country Y can have a different price.
Same price among all countries in Europe cannot be true... you even have different prices on Amazon stores in Europe like amazon.de amazon.fr amazon.it amazon.es on same goods from the very same warehouse etc.
Other example Netflix or Youtube Premium subscriptions, they are also not the same price among whole EU (for example Denmark vs. Bulgaria)
I am fairly certain that you're misreading that, though as with all regulations - having a legal team on standby is practically a requirement. It's talking about literal in-country discrimination. For example many touristy locations will have a price for locals and a price for non-locals at places like e.g. zoos. That would be illegal in the EU. By contrast it explicitly states that:
"When you buy goods online in the EU, prices may vary [their emphasis, not mine] from country to country or across different versions of the same website, for example due to differences in delivery costs."
A nice rule of thumb for translating legalese is to translate "may" to "will" (except when it would benefit you), and to strip off examples. So for instance: "We may share your data, for instance with trusted partners or in response to legal obligations." translates to "We will share your data with whoever we want." And here too you can translate it to simply, "Prices will vary from country to country."
The example they give is someone from Denmark buying something in Spain, so I'm not sure where you've got the idea of it being an "in-country" rule from.
The point of the regulation is to prevent things like charging foreigners more products or services that will be consumed in-country. The example covers the scenario of "Well what if I'm in a different country than a vendor making a purchase (in which case it is okay for the vendor to charge more), but what I am purchasing will be obtained/'consumed' in the country of the vendor (in which case it is not okay for the vendor to charge more)?" And in that case it's also against the regulations to charge more.
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Rule: "However, if you buy goods online without cross-border delivery – such as when you buy something online which you intend to collect from a trader or shop yourself – you should have access to the same prices and special offers as buyers living in that EU country."
Example: "Hilda from Denmark wanted to book a hire car in Spain for her summer holidays. She chose the car she wanted to book on the website of a Spanish car rental company. However, when she entered her address to finalise the reservation, she saw that the total price for her car rental increased by EUR 140. [This action is against the regulations.]"
A separation in the registration/login flow is pretty common - you only see the prices without vat if you’re a registered business customer, often they require either a VAT-ID or other proof you’re a business customer.
Businesses reclaim any VAT they pay. You file a monthly/ Quarterly/Yearly report to the taxman either to Pay VAT you collectes or to rexlaim VAT you paid
Never said that. Everyone should respect and follow it (and it seems it's not enforced across many international companies). But this law is not without its practical problems for selling digital services B2C on the Internet across EU.
The article leaves the impression as if only Twitter doing it which is clearly not the case here.
It's also a little frustrating (for small companies) if you sell across the whole EU single market (and also beyond like e.g. UK and many other countries) and have a very dynamic price frontend depending on user's country detection.
Btw. does anybody know if I can sell with fixed pricing for whole EU and cut my profit dynamically depending on user's country VAT rate? E.g. I charge 10 EUR for everyone in EU but I deduct 19% VAT in the backend for Germany, 21% for Spain etc. and basically make a little more profit with a German customer ?