In a most recent judgment following a Polish request for a preliminary ruling, the General Court of the EU confirmed the incompatibility of the local input VAT regulations with EU Law and held that the right to deduct input VAT arises with the supply and the chargeability of the tax, and must not depend on the immediate possession of an invoice provided that the taxable person did receive the invoice before submitting the VAT return. Any national “forced deferral” violates the principle of fiscal neutrality.
On 15 November 2017 the European Court of Justice (ECJ) published its decision in the joined cases of Geissel and Butin ruling that Directive 2006/112/EC of 28 November 2006 on the common system of value added tax (“the VAT Directive”) - Articles 168(a) and 178 (a) together with Article 226(5) - must be interpreted as precluding national legislation, which makes the exercise of the right to deduct input VAT subject to the condition that the address where the issuer of an invoice carries out its economic activity must be indicated on the invoice.
An ECJ advocate general has suggested that the address of the issuer of an invoice must not be identical with the place from where he carries out his economic activity and that any type of address under which the supplier can effectively be contacted is sufficient.
