The long-awaited German Federal Ministry of Finance circular on fuel card transactions has now been published. It clarifies that the Ministry’s circular dated 15 June 2004 on car leasing transactions also applies to fuel card transactions. The long-running uncertainty following the 2019 ECJ judgment in Vega International on the VAT treatment of chain transactions in fuel deliveries with fuel cards has thus been resolved, at least to some extent. Our newsletter includes background information on exactly what is now regulated and what still needs to be considered.

By 31 January 2025, at the latest, platform operators must again submit a DAC7 report to the German Federal Central Tax Office in accordance with the Platform Tax Transparency Act (PStTG). Although the framework conditions for this have changed slightly, compared to the first DAC7 report, the difficul-ties in preparing and submitting the report (eg implementing the electronic in-terface) continue to exist.

As from 1 January 2025, significant new regulations regarding tax audits will now be applicable for the first time in Germany. The aim of the reform is to carry out tax audits in a more timely and efficient manner in order to provide taxable persons with legal and planning security at an early stage. This is to be achieved by means of new regulations regarding the limitation period for assessments and the procedural course of the tax audit, which now allows for agreements between the taxable person and the tax office, as well as for applications for a partial final assessment. This results in new options under procedural law. At the same time, the obligations for taxable persons to cooperate, make references and attend to corrections are being expanded. For taxable persons, this will mean making adjustments to their Tax Compliance Management System.