In J Plöckl v Finanzamt Schrobenhausen (Case C-24/15) (20 October 2016) the CJEU found that non-compliance with formal requirements did not justify the refusal to allow an exemption in circumstances where the substantive requirements were satisfied.
Mr Plöckl had acquired a car which he had assigned to his business. He then dispatched it to a dealer in Spain in order to sell it there and the vehicle had been sold. Mr Plöckl had reported the transfer on his VAT return as a VAT exempt intra-community transfer.
The German tax authorities considered however that the supply was subject to German VAT since Mr Plöckl had not provided a Spanish VAT registration number as required to claim the exemption (Principal VAT Directive art 28a(5)(b)). The issue was therefore whether the German tax authorities had been right to refuse the exemption when there was no evidence of tax evasion...
