VAT Reduction 2020 Construction industry and partial services

Construction industry and partial services

Requirements

Partial services are economically delimitable parts of standardized services (e.g. work deliveries and work services) for which the remuneration is agreed separately and which are therefore owed instead of the standardized overall service.

Approval and effect

Work deliveries or parts of a work delivery shall be deemed to have been executed when the completed (partial) work has been accepted by the purchaser.
This means that the 19 % tax rate can only be applied as long as the (part) work is actually accepted before 1.7.2020.
If the (partial) work is accepted in the period from 30.6.2020 - 31.12.2020, then the 16 % tax rate applies.

Example

The company “Bau-Eleganz” constructs a turn-key one-family house and the outdoor facilities for Willi Himmelhuber. The company Bau-Eleganz is building a turnkey one-family house and the outdoor facilities for Willi Himmelhuber. The contract regulates the immediate handover after completion of the house (expected November 2020). The outdoor facilities will be taken over after their completion in spring (presumably May 2021).
The fee for the one-family house is 500,000 € plus VAT. For the outdoor facilities, 30,000 € plus VAT are agreed.

Solution

With the acceptance of the one-family house in November 2020, the partial performance one-family house" is considered to be completed. The VAT is therefore 16 % of 500,000 (= 80,000 €).
The partial performance "outdoor facilities" is not completed until May 2021, when the acceptance of the building is scheduled. Therefore, the tax rate of 19 % is to be applied to this partial performance; tax load thus 19 % of 30,000 € = 5,700 €.