Fabian Barth explores the importance of contracts in identifying the supplier and recipient in a VAT supply.
It is often said that VAT is a tax where substance matters more than form, and where the true economic reality is determinative, rather than the precise wording which might be employed in the underlying contracts.
While there is much truth in those beliefs, too much emphasis thereon is prone to the risk of underestimating the role which contractual wording nevertheless plays in VAT. Contracts influence especially one issue, which frequently sits at the heart of many VAT disputes: which party makes a supply, and who receives it?
