Taxes
This chapter describes how the marketplace is structured for tax purposes. It is not tax advice. For questions about your own situation, please consult your tax adviser.
You are the seller, you owe the VAT on your sales. The marketplace acts as an intermediary (see What the marketplace does); your payout therefore includes the VAT on your sales, and you remit it to your tax office. The Seller Center shows you the amounts per order.
Our commission is subject to its own VAT, and the rate depends on where you are based:
| Where you are based | VAT on the commission |
|---|---|
| Germany | 19% (deductible as input tax) |
| rest of the EU, with a valid VAT ID | 0%: reverse charge, you owe the tax in your country (Section 3a (2) German VAT Act) |
| outside the EU | not taxable in Germany |
Your VAT ID is a prerequisite for selling, not a formality. As a marketplace operator we are liable under Section 25e of the German VAT Act for VAT that our sellers fail to remit; the statutory protection against this is your valid VAT ID, verified against the EU system (VIES). That is why we verify the number right after you enter it and regularly afterwards. Without a verified number, no product can go live. If you change the number, it is verified again.
What we must record and report about you
- Section 22f German VAT Act: we keep the legally required details about our sellers (including name, address, tax number/VAT ID) and provide them to the tax office on request.
- PStTG (DAC 7): once a year (by 31 January) we report your identification details, your remuneration per quarter and the fees and commissions withheld to the German Federal Central Tax Office. What is reported is the remuneration, not a VAT amount. You will be informed which data about you has been reported.
Special case: based outside the EU
If you ship from a third country or are not established in the EU, the marketplace itself may be deemed the supplier under Section 3 (3a) of the German VAT Act and owe the VAT on the sale. Whether this applies to you is clarified during onboarding based on your place of business and your shipping country. That is why both details are mandatory and asked for separately.
Small businesses and businesses based outside the EU
Two cases we cannot onboard at the moment, and the Seller Center says so when you submit:
- Small businesses under Section 19 of the German VAT Act. The marketplace shows VAT on every sale. A small business must not do that and would still owe the VAT shown (Section 14c (1)). That is why we currently cannot take you on. ⚠️ Please write to us before setting up: we do not ask about small business status at the moment and therefore cannot recognise it ourselves. Write to us if this applies to you.
- Based outside the EU. There are two reasons. First, VAT: for customers in the EU we would be deemed the supplier and would owe a tax that we cannot remit without an IOSS registration. Second, product liability: if a brand ships from a third country straight to consumers in the EU, there is often no liable economic operator established in the Union, and then we are liable as the platform. The restriction is therefore lifted only once both are in place: our IOSS registration and an authorised representative of your brand established in the Union (Brand Agreement § 2(5)).