The VAT gap (the difference between actual and expected VAT revenues) across the EU decreased by €2.5bn during 2014 to just under €160bn. As a percentage, this represents a fall of 0.7%, to 14%. EU VAT revenues over the period increased by 4%.
Commissioner Pierre Moscovici said: ‘Our member states are losing tens of billions of euros in uncollected VAT revenue. This is unacceptable. The current regime is woefully ill-equipped to deal with the problems of VAT fraud and miscalculations, and it's clear that the numbers will not get better by themselves. Member states must now quickly agree on a definitive fraud-proof EU VAT system, as laid out by the Commission earlier this year. I therefore urge all of our member states to have a frank and meaningful discussion in order to feed into next year's proposals, so we can tackle this issue once and for all.’
The VAT gap rate ranged from a high of 37.9% of uncollected VAT in Romania, to a low of only 1.2% in Sweden. The VAT gap in the UK was 10.14%, close to the EU median of 10.4%.
The VAT gap (the difference between actual and expected VAT revenues) across the EU decreased by €2.5bn during 2014 to just under €160bn. As a percentage, this represents a fall of 0.7%, to 14%. EU VAT revenues over the period increased by 4%.
Commissioner Pierre Moscovici said: ‘Our member states are losing tens of billions of euros in uncollected VAT revenue. This is unacceptable. The current regime is woefully ill-equipped to deal with the problems of VAT fraud and miscalculations, and it's clear that the numbers will not get better by themselves. Member states must now quickly agree on a definitive fraud-proof EU VAT system, as laid out by the Commission earlier this year. I therefore urge all of our member states to have a frank and meaningful discussion in order to feed into next year's proposals, so we can tackle this issue once and for all.’
The VAT gap rate ranged from a high of 37.9% of uncollected VAT in Romania, to a low of only 1.2% in Sweden. The VAT gap in the UK was 10.14%, close to the EU median of 10.4%.
