• Travelsignposts Home
  • Country Guides
  • City Guides
  • River Cruises
  • Europe Photos
  • About Us

Europe Travel

  • Home
  • Photos
  • Map
  • Weather
  • Site Map
  • Travel Tips
  • Sightseeing
  • Getting around
  • Useful facts
  • News & Events
You are here: Home / Useful facts / VAT in Europe – The Rise and Rise of VAT

VAT in Europe – The Rise and Rise of VAT

By Helen Page Leave a Comment

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window) Pinterest
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window) LinkedIn

VAT is on the Increase in Europe:

Galeries Lafayette - claim your VAT back!

Galeries Lafayette – claim your VAT back!

As Europe muddles through to sort out its economic crisis, one of the many measures adopted for raising revenue has been the increase of VAT rates.

It may be called by different names, but Value Added Tax (VAT) unfortunately impacts on the cost of our travel (not to mention shopping) and some of the VAT rates in Europe are already extremely high.

So any further VAT increases certainly isn’t good news for the travelling public.

VAT RefundWhat is Vat

Unfortunately, VAT is not “Vodka and Tonic” as one cartoon suggests.

Value Added Tax or VAT is a broadly based consumption tax that is assessable on goods and services. From a traveller’s perspective, we pay VAT on accommodation, restaurant meals and other goods and services that we consume on holidays. It is a government tax and the seller of the goods and services is required to collect the tax and pay it to the revenue authorities.

VAT is payable in all EU member states and in France you will see it referred to as TVA (Taxe sur la Valeur Ajoutée) or in Italy it is IVA (Imposta sul Valore Aggiunto).

VAT Refund

For travellers who live outside of the EU, you can get a VAT refund on your shopping in Europe, if the value of your purchases meets the VAT threshold of that country. So, if you’re planning on doing a lot of shopping on your European holiday, it pays to find out about the VAT rules for that country.

VAT Tax Rate for 2012

Below are 2012 Standard VAT tax rates for some of the destinations we cover:

Vat Rates for 2012
Country Standard Vat Rate Comments
Austria 20%  
Belgium 21%  
Bulgaria 20%  
Czech Republic 20%  
Estonia 20%  
France 19.6% Increasing to 21.2% in October 2012
Germany 19%  
Greece 23%  
Ireland 23% Increased in January 2012
Italy 21% Increasing to 23% in 2012
Netherlands 19%  
Norway 25%  
Portugal 23%  
Spain 18%  
Switzerland 8% Maintaines at this rate until 2018
United Kingdom 20%  

Click here to get a free PDF of this post

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window) Pinterest
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window) LinkedIn

Related

Filed Under: Useful facts Tagged With: claiming vat refund, vat, vat in eu, vat refund, vat threshold, what is vat

avatar

About Helen Page

Helen Page is a prolific blogger and ardent traveller; she runs Travelsignposts with her professional writer and photographer husband Tony.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

You can also find us on

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Latest Additions

  • VAT in Europe – The Rise and Rise of VAT
  • Airports You Wouldn’t Mind Being Marooned At
  • Using Credit Cards In Europe: What You Need To Know

Plan and Book Your Trip


eNews and Updates

feedburner Sign up now to get emailed news as well as other site updates!

Get the Guerrilla Travel Photography ebook here now!
City Guides
Country Guides
River Cruises

Who is behind Travelsignposts?

Helen and Tony Page at Singapore Changi Airport

We're Helen and Tony Page, and we love travelling - lucky as we've been doing it for the last few decades!

Tony has long been a professional photographer and writer, but Helen now writes most of the posts and takes a lot of photos herself!

Travelsignposts is our main travel planning site, but we've just launched Travelsignposts China and Tony also runs the Travelsignposts Photo and Guerrilla Travel Photography web sites, as well as publishing the Take Better Digital Photos and Guerrilla Travel Photography eBooks.

Read more about Helen and Tony or contact them.

Other Countries

  • Austria
  • Belgium
  • Bulgaria
  • Croatia
  • England
  • Estonia
  • Finland
  • France
  • Germany
  • Greece
  • Ireland
  • Italy
  • Netherlands
  • Norway
  • Portugal
  • Scotland
  • Spain
  • Switzerland
  • Turkey
  • Ukraine

Resources

  • Take Better Digital Photos eBook Take Better Digital Photos eBook
  • Take Better Digital Photos Free eCourse
  • Travel Signposts Photo – our main travel photography site
  • Guerrilla Travel Photography eBook Guerrilla Travel Photography eBook

Copyright Travelsignposts Pty Ltd © 2025 Log in

Get a free PDF of this post!
Just enter your email address below and we'll send it to you immediately.

Please enter your Email Address