The VAT Recovery Process

Once you engage ExportVAT to reclaim your VAT for you, the procedure is straightforward and requires minimal work on your side. 

The steps are as follows:

1. Send us your documents for review
   Make sure you have all the original documents that show the amount of VAT paid by your company. Make sure these invoices show the date, the invoice amount, the VAT amount and the name and address of your company.
    
   Please fax or scan and email those documents to us for review. We will review the documents and check whether you comply with the requirements for the VAT refund.
    
2. Fill out our webform to apply for an IRS 6166 form
   We need an IRS form (6166) to prove the local tax authorities that your company is a taxable entity, eligible for a VAT refund. We can fill out the IRS papers to apply for that form. You will need to fill out our webform that contains the relevant questions for a VAT refund. We will then email you the filled out form so you can print and sign it, and send it to the IRS.
    
   Please note that it will take a couple of months before the IRS will send the 6166 form. The deadline for the 2008 VAT refund is end of June 2009, we need the 6166 form well before this deadline. Please fill out our webform as soon as possible to avoid missing the deadline.
    
3. Power of Attorney and Terms and Conditions
   We will send you a template for a Power of Attorney. We need a signed PoA, printed on your letterhead, to negotiate the tax refund on your behalf with the local Tax Authorities.
    
4. Send us the original documents
   Please send the original invoice documents, the signed Terms and Conditions and the Power of Attorney to our Front Office in Chicago.
    
   We will forward those documents to our Back Office in Europe, they will process the refund and negotiate with the local tax authority.
    
   In certain cases (Germany), the tax Law requires that the CEO, CFO or COO signs the tax reclaim forms. In this case we will send you the filled out forms by email and ask you to print them out, sign them and send them to us for review. In other cases, we will signs the tax reclaim forms ourselves
    
5. Return original documents
   The tax authority will make copies of the documents and will return the original documents to us. We will send them back to you.
    
6. Transfer the refund
   6-9 months after the VAT refund filing, the tax authority will decide about the refund and will transfer the refund to us. We will transfer the refund to you minus our fee.

A Business Case

A high-tech company has send shipments worth $800,000 to the EU in 2007. They have paid a total of $152,000 VAT to the express carrier.

Before the VAT reclaim, their profit was $68,000 or 8.5% (after the  deduction of costs for taxes and duties paid to the express carrier).

After the VAT reclaim their profit increased to $220,000 or 27.5%! If they had wanted to make the same profit without reclaiming VAT, they would have to have had a turnover of $2.5 million !