(Art. 81 VAT Act)

The FTA is en­titled with­in the mean­ing of Art­icle 89 para­graph 2 let­ter a of the Fed­er­al Su­preme Court Act of 17 June 2005¹²³ to ap­peal to the Fed­er­al Court.

(Art. 86 VAT Act)

If the debt en­force­ment claim un­der Art­icle 86 para­graph 9 VAT Act is with­drawn, the tax­able per­son bears the en­force­ment costs in­curred.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

¹ In­sti­tu­tion­al and in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies are en­titled to claim re­lief from VAT.

² In­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies are:

a.

be­ne­fi­ciar­ies un­der Art­icle 2 para­graph 1 HSA¹²⁴ who are ex­empt from the in­dir­ect taxes in ac­cord­ance with pub­lic in­ter­na­tion­al law, an agree­ment con­cluded with the Fed­er­al Coun­cil for ex­emp­tion from the in­dir­ect taxes or a de­cision of the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of For­eign Af­fairs (FD­FA) un­der Art­icle 26 para­graph 3 HSA;

b.

be­ne­fi­ciar­ies un­der Art­icle 2 para­graph 1 HSA dom­i­ciled abroad, to the ex­tent they are ex­empt from the in­dir­ect taxes in ac­cord­ance with their found­a­tion deeds, a pro­tocol con­cern­ing the priv­ileges and im­munit­ies or oth­er pub­lic in­ter­na­tion­al law agree­ments.

³ In­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies are:

a.

heads of state and gov­ern­ment while ac­tu­ally ex­er­cising an of­fi­cial func­tion on Swiss ter­rit­ory and per­sons in their en­tour­age who en­joy dip­lo­mat­ic status;

b.

dip­lo­mat­ic rep­res­ent­at­ives, con­su­lar of­fi­cials, and per­sons in their en­tour­age, provided they en­joy the same dip­lo­mat­ic status as the former on Swiss ter­rit­ory;

c.

high of­fi­cials of in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies un­der para­graph 2 let­ter a who en­joy dip­lo­mat­ic status and the per­sons in their en­tour­age, to the ex­tent they en­joy the same dip­lo­mat­ic status on Swiss ter­rit­ory provided they are ex­empt from in­dir­ect taxes on the basis of an agree­ment between the Fed­er­al Coun­cil or the FD­FA and the in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies in ques­tion or on the basis of a uni­lat­er­al de­cision of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil or of the FD­FA;

d.

del­eg­ates to in­ter­na­tion­al con­fer­ences, who en­joy dip­lo­mat­ic status, if the in­ter­na­tion­al con­fer­ence they are at­tend­ing is it­self ex­empt from the in­dir­ect taxes in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 2 let­ter a;

e.

per­sons car­ry­ing out an in­ter­na­tion­al man­date un­der Art­icle 2 para­graph 2 let­ter b HSA, who en­joy dip­lo­mat­ic status on Swiss ter­rit­ory and are ex­empt from the in­dir­ect taxes on the basis of a de­cision of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil and the per­sons in their en­tour­age, provided such en­joy the same dip­lo­mat­ic status.

⁴ Swiss cit­izens have no claim to tax re­lief.

⁵ Re­lief from VAT is ef­fected by tax ex­emp­tion at source un­der Art­icles 144 and 145 and, in ex­cep­tion­al cases, by re­fund un­der Art­icle 146.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

¹ Ex­empt from the tax are:

a.

sup­plies of goods and ser­vices on Swiss ter­rit­ory by tax­able per­sons to in­sti­tu­tion­al and in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies;

b.¹²⁵

the ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies from busi­nesses with their place of busi­ness abroad by in­sti­tu­tion­al and in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies.

² The tax ex­emp­tion ap­plies only to sup­plies of goods and sup­plies of ser­vices:

a.

to in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies if they are ex­clus­ively for per­son­al use;

b.

to in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies if they are ex­clus­ively for of­fi­cial use.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

¹ An in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciary that wishes to claim a tax ex­emp­tion must be­fore every ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies cer­ti­fy on the of­fi­cial form that the sup­plies ac­quired are for of­fi­cial use.

² An in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciary who wishes to claim tax ex­emp­tion must be­fore every ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies have cer­ti­fied by the in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciary to which the per­son be­longs, on the of­fi­cial form, that the per­son en­joys the status un­der Art­icle 143 para­graph 3, which con­fers en­ti­tle­ment to tax free ac­quis­i­tion. The in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciary must hand over the of­fi­cial form signed in per­son to the sup­pli­er and identi­fy him­self on every ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies with the iden­ti­fic­a­tion card is­sued by the com­pet­ent fed­er­al au­thor­ity.

³ A tax ex­emp­tion un­der Art­icle 144 para­graph 1 let­ter a may be claimed only if the ef­fect­ive ac­quis­i­tion price for the sup­plies in­dic­ated on the in­voice or an equi­val­ent doc­u­ment is at least 100 francs, in­clud­ing tax. This min­im­um amount does not ap­ply to tele­com­mu­nic­a­tions and elec­tron­ic ser­vices un­der Art­icle 10 and for sup­plies of wa­ter in pipes, gas and elec­tri­city by util­ity com­pan­ies.

⁴ The con­di­tions un­der para­graphs 1–3 for claim­ing tax ex­emp­tion do not ap­ply to ac­quis­i­tions of mo­tor fuel for which the in­sti­tu­tion­al or the in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciary may claim ex­emp­tion from the min­er­al oil tax based on Art­icles 26–28 of the Min­er­al Oil Tax Or­din­ance of 20 Novem­ber 1996¹²⁶, on Art­icles 30 and 31 of the Or­din­ance of 23 Au­gust 1989¹²⁷on the Cus­toms Priv­ileges of Dip­lo­mat­ic Mis­sions in Bern and Con­su­lar Posts on Swiss ter­rit­ory and of Art­icles 28 and 29 of the Or­din­ance of 13 Novem­ber 1985¹²⁸on the Cus­toms Priv­ileges of In­ter­na­tion­al Or­gan­isa­tions, of States in their re­la­tions with such Or­gan­isa­tions and of Spe­cial Mis­sions of For­eign States. In this case the sup­pli­er must be able to prove that the FO­CBS has not levied the min­er­al oil tax or has re­fun­ded it.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

¹ In jus­ti­fied cases, the FTA may on ap­plic­a­tion re­fund tax amounts already paid for which a claim to tax re­lief ex­ists; it may, in con­sulta­tion with the FD­FA, charge a pro­cessing fee for this ser­vice.

² For the tax re­fund, Art­icle 145 para­graph 3 ap­plies by ana­logy.

³ An in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciary may not make more than two ap­plic­a­tions for a tax re­fund per cal­en­dar year. The of­fi­cial form must be used.

⁴ In­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies may not make more than one ap­plic­a­tion for a tax re­fund per cal­en­dar year. The ap­plic­a­tions by in­di­vidu­al per­sons must be col­lec­ted by the or­gan­isa­tion to which they be­long for sub­mis­sion once an­nu­ally.

⁵ The FTA may, in con­sulta­tion with the FD­FA, set a min­im­um re­fund amount per ap­plic­a­tion. No pay­ment in­terest is paid on the re­fund amounts.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

The tax­able per­son must re­tain in full the ori­gin­als of the of­fi­cial forms used, to­geth­er with the oth­er re­ceipts, in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 70 para­graph 2 VAT Act. For elec­tron­ic­ally trans­mit­ted and stored of­fi­cial forms, Art­icle 122¹²⁹ ap­plies by ana­logy.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

The tax on sup­plies of goods, on im­ports of goods and on sup­plies of ser­vices that are used to ef­fect tax free sup­plies to in­sti­tu­tion­al and in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies may be de­duc­ted as in­put tax.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

¹ If the con­di­tions for a tax ex­emp­tion un­der Art­icles 144 and 145 are not met or sub­sequently not ful­filled, in cases of tax ex­emp­tion un­der Art­icle 144 para­graph 1 let­ter a the in­sti­tu­tion­al or the in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciary is ob­liged to pay the tax­able per­son an amount equi­val­ent to the tax due. If this amount is not paid, it is due by the tax­able per­son, to the ex­tent this per­son is at fault. In­sti­tu­tion­al and in­di­vidu­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies are ob­liged to pay the tax sub­sequently on the ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies of ser­vices from busi­nesses with their place of busi­ness abroad.

² The pro­vi­sions of the Vi­enna Con­ven­tions dated 18 April 1961¹³⁰on Dip­lo­mat­ic Re­la­tions and dated 24 April 1963¹³¹on Con­su­lar Re­la­tions and of the Headquar­ters Agree­ment are re­served.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

The FTA can ap­prove the vol­un­tary tax­a­tion of the sup­plies re­ferred to in Art­icle 21 para­graph 2 num­bers 20 and 21 VAT Act, without the value of the land, provided they have been made to in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciar­ies un­der Art­icle 143 para­graph 2 let­ter a, re­gard­less wheth­er the in­sti­tu­tion­al be­ne­fi­ciary is li­able for tax on Swiss ter­rit­ory or not. This op­tion is lim­ited to prop­er­ties and parts of prop­er­ties used for ad­min­is­trat­ive pur­poses, and in par­tic­u­lar to of­fices, con­fer­ence rooms, ware­houses, park­ing places, or which are in­ten­ded as the res­id­ence of the head of a dip­lo­mat­ic mis­sion, a per­man­ent mis­sion or an­oth­er rep­res­ent­at­ive in inter-gov­ern­ment­al or­gan­isa­tions or of a con­su­lar post.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. b VAT Act)

¹ The right to a re­fund of the taxes in­curred un­der Art­icle 28 para­graph 1 let­ter a and c VAT Act shall be gran­ted to per­sons who im­port goods or have sup­plies made on the ter­rit­ory of the Swiss Con­fed­er­a­tion against a con­sid­er­a­tion provided they also:¹³²

a.

have their dom­i­cile, place of busi­ness or per­man­ent es­tab­lish­ment abroad;

b.

are not a tax­able per­son on Swiss ter­rit­ory;

c.

do not make sup­plies on Swiss ter­rit­ory sub­ject to para­graph 2; and

d.

prove to the FTA their busi­ness char­ac­ter in the state of their dom­i­cile, of their place of busi­ness or of the per­man­ent es­tab­lish­ment.

² The en­ti­tle­ment to a tax re­fund re­mains in­tact if the per­son is ex­empt from tax li­ab­il­ity un­der Art­icle 10 para­graph 2 let­ter b VAT Act and does not waive this ex­emp­tion.¹³³

³ Re­fund of the tax is con­di­tion­al on the state of res­id­ence or of place of busi­ness or of the per­man­ent es­tab­lish­ment of the ap­plic­ant busi­ness grant­ing a cor­res­pond­ing re­cip­roc­al right.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. b VAT Act)

¹ Re­cip­roc­al right is deemed to be giv­en if:

a.

busi­nesses with their dom­i­cile or place of busi­ness on Swiss ter­rit­ory have the right to claim re­funds in the for­eign state con­cerned of the VAT paid on sup­plies ac­quired there which in scope and re­stric­tions is com­men­sur­ate with the right of in­put tax de­duc­tion which busi­nesses res­id­ent in the for­eign state en­joy;

b.

in the for­eign state con­cerned a tax com­par­able with the Swiss VAT is not im­posed; or

c.

in the for­eign state con­cerned a dif­fer­ent type of sales tax from the Swiss VAT is im­posed, which af­fects busi­nesses with their dom­i­cile or place of busi­ness in the for­eign state in the same way as busi­nesses with their dom­i­cile or place of busi­ness on Swiss ter­rit­ory.

² The FTA shall main­tain a list of the states with which a re­cip­roc­al right de­clar­a­tion has been ex­changed un­der para­graph 1 let­ter a.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. b VAT Act)

¹ The tax re­fund is com­men­sur­ate in scope and lim­it­a­tions with the right of in­put tax de­duc­tion un­der Art­icles 28–30 and 33 para­graph 2 VAT Act. A re­fund is made at a rate of tax that is no high­er than the stat­utory max­im­um rate for the sup­ply con­cerned. Value ad­ded tax paid on sup­plies that are not sub­ject to or ex­empt from tax un­der the VAT Act is not re­fun­ded.¹³⁴

² Travel agents and or­gan­isers of events with their place of busi­ness abroad are not en­titled to re­funds of the taxes which have been in­voiced to them on the ter­rit­ory of the Swiss Con­fed­er­a­tion for the ac­quis­i­tion of sup­plies of goods and sup­plies of ser­vices that they charge on to cus­tom­ers.¹³⁵

³ Re­pay­able taxes are re­fun­ded only if their amount in a cal­en­dar year reaches at least 500 francs.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. b VAT Act)

¹ The re­fund peri­od cor­res­ponds to the cal­en­dar year. The ap­plic­a­tion for a re­fund must be made with­in six months of the end of the cal­en­dar year in which an in­voice was is­sued for the sup­ply made.

² If the sup­pli­er be­comes li­able for tax, the re­fund peri­od ends at this time. The ap­plic­a­tion for a tax re­fund for this peri­od must be sub­mit­ted with the first VAT re­turn.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let. b VAT Act)

¹ The ap­plic­a­tion for a tax re­fund must be ad­dressed to the FTA with the sup­pli­ers’ ori­gin­al in­voices or with the FO­CBS’ as­sess­ment ad­vice. The ori­gin­al in­voices must meet the re­quire­ments un­der Art­icle 26 para­graph 2 VAT Act and be in the name of the ap­plic­ant.

² The FTA’s form must be used for the ap­plic­a­tion.

³ The ap­plic­ant must ap­point a rep­res­ent­at­ive with dom­i­cile or with a place of busi­ness on Swiss ter­rit­ory.

⁴ The tax dis­played on cash re­ceipts may not be re­fun­ded.

⁵ The FTA may de­mand fur­ther de­tails and doc­u­ment­a­tion.

(Art. 107 para. 1 let.. b VAT Act)

If the tax re­fund is paid out later than 180 days after re­ceipt of the com­plete ap­plic­a­tion by the FTA, re­fund in­terest set by the FDF is paid for the peri­od from the 181st day un­til pay­ment, provided the rel­ev­ant state grants re­cip­roc­al rights.

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

The Value Ad­ded Tax Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion (Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion) is an ex­tra-par­lia­ment­ary com­mis­sion un­der Art­icle 57a of the Gov­ern­ment and Ad­min­is­trat­ive Or­gan­isa­tion Act of 21 March 1997¹³⁹.

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

The Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion com­prises four­teen per­man­ent mem­bers.

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

¹ The Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion meets as ne­ces­sary. Meet­ings are con­vened by the chair­per­son.

^1bis The FTA at­tends the meet­ings of the Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sions in an ad­vis­ory ca­pa­city.¹⁴¹

² The FTA per­forms the ad­min­is­trat­ive sec­ret­ari­al work and takes the minutes; the minutes shall in­clude the re­com­mend­a­tions of the Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sions and any ma­jor­ity and minor­ity opin­ions.¹⁴²

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

The Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion sub­mits its com­ments and re­com­mend­a­tions to the FDF. It may dis­close any ma­jor­ity and minor­ity opin­ions.

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

¹ The Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion has no power of de­cision.

² The de­cision to es­tab­lish prac­tice lies with the FTA.¹⁴⁴

(Art. 109 VAT Act)

¹ The dis­cus­sions and the doc­u­ments laid be­fore or drawn up by the Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion are con­fid­en­tial. This does not in­clude drafts of es­tab­lished prac­tice by the FTA; these are pub­lished elec­tron­ic­ally on the FTA web­site¹⁴⁶ at the same time that the in­vit­a­tion to the meet­ing of the Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion at which they are ex­pec­ted to be dis­cussed is sent.

² With the con­sent of the FTA, the Con­sultat­ive Com­mis­sion may provide the pub­lic with in­form­a­tion about its busi­ness.

The Or­din­ance of 29 March 2000¹⁴⁷to the Fed­er­al Act on Value Ad­ded Tax is re­pealed.

(Art. 15 para. 4 VAT Act)

The as­sign­ee is li­able only for the VAT on re­ceiv­ables which it ac­quires un­der a glob­al as­sign­ment con­cluded after 1 Janu­ary 2010.

(Art. 32 VAT Act)

The pro­vi­sions con­cern­ing sub­sequent in­put tax de­duc­tion do not ap­ply to:

a.¹⁴⁸

flows of funds not qual­i­fy­ing as con­sid­er­a­tions (Art. 18 para. 2 VAT Act), which after the new law comes in­to force no longer res­ult in a re­duc­tion of the in­put tax de­duc­tion un­der Art­icle 33 para­graph 2 VAT Act;

b.

own sup­plies taxed as own use for con­struc­tion pur­poses un­der Art­icle 9 para­graph 2 of the VAT Act dated 2 Septem­ber 1999¹⁴⁹.

(Art. 37 and 114 VAT Act)

¹ When the VAT Act comes in­to force, the no­tice peri­ods un­der Art­icle 37 para­graph 4 VAT Act for chan­ging from the ef­fect­ive re­port­ing meth­od to the net tax rate meth­od and vice versa be­gin to run again.

² When the VAT Act comes in­to force, the no­tice peri­ods un­der Art­icle 98 para­graph 2 for chan­ging from the ef­fect­ive re­port­ing meth­od to the flat tax rate meth­od and vices versa be­gin to run again.

³ Where Art­icle 114 para­graph 2 VAT Act provides for a no­tice peri­od of 90 days, this no­tice peri­od takes pre­ced­ence over the 60-day no­tice peri­od un­der Art­icles 79, 81 and 98 of this Or­din­ance.¹⁵⁰

(Art. 10 para. 1 let. a VAT Act)

In the case of for­eign busi­nesses without a per­man­ent es­tab­lish­ment on Swiss ter­rit­ory that have made tax­able sup­plies on Swiss ter­rit­ory in the twelve months be­fore this Or­din­ance comes in­to force, the ex­emp­tion from tax li­ab­il­ity un­der Art­icle 9a ter­min­ates when this Or­din­ance comes in­to force, provided in these twelve months they have reached the turnover threshold un­der Art­icle 10 para­graph 2 let­ter a or c VAT Act for sup­plies on Swiss ter­rit­ory and abroad that are not ex­empt from the tax without cred­it and it must be as­sumed that they will also provide tax­able sup­plies on Swiss ter­rit­ory in the twelve months fol­low­ing this Or­din­ance com­ing in­to force. If the sup­plies were not made for the en­tire twelve months be­fore this Or­din­ance comes in­to force, the turnover must be ex­tra­pol­ated to a full year.

(Art. 7 para. 3 let. b VAT Act)

Where goods sup­plied from abroad onto Swiss ter­rit­ory are ex­empt from im­port tax be­cause of the neg­li­gible amount of tax, the sup­pli­er be­comes li­able for tax when the Amend­ment of 15 Au­gust 2018 comes in­to force if it achieved a turnover of 100 000 francs or more from sup­ply­ing such goods in the pre­vi­ous twelve months and it must be as­sumed that it will con­tin­ue to make such sup­plies in the twelve months fol­low­ing the amend­ment com­ing in­to force.

(Art. 65a VAT Act and Art. 123 of this Or­din­ance)

¹ Tax­able per­sons that have filed their re­turns in pa­per form be­fore the Amend­ment of 16 June 2023 comes in­to force may con­tin­ue to file their re­turns in pa­per form un­til 31 Decem­ber 2024.

² Cor­rec­tions of re­turns that have been filed in pa­per form must also be filed in pa­per form.

¹ This Or­din­ance, with the ex­cep­tion of Art­icle 76, comes in­to force on 1 Janu­ary 2010.

² Art­icle 76 comes in­to force at a later date.