Law Decree no. 193 dated 22 October 2016 introduced measures for a more efficient and prompt filing by taxpayers of data relevant to purchase and sale operations, in order to prevent some forms of tax fraud. For this purpose, Law Decree dated 31 May 2010, no. 78 was amended, replacing art. 21, relevant to the electronic transmission of sales and purchase invoices, and introducing new art. 21-bis, relevant to the electronic transmission of periodical VAT calculation.
To counterbalance the onerousness of such new fulfilments, some simplifications were introduced, including the abolition of the obligation to file INTRASTAT forms – summarizing intra-EU purchases and generic services provided by entities established in another EU Member state – starting from 1 January 2017.
This abolition implied that INTRA-2 forms relevant to purchase (of goods and services) operations carried out from the beginning of the current year did not have to be filed any more. As a consequence, in case of purchases of goods from other Member states, not only tax information (columns 1 to 7), but also statistical information did not have to be provided any more. The non-provision of the abovementioned data would mean the non-compliance with an EU obligation ruled by Regulation (EC) 638/2004 and by the related implementing Regulation 1982/2004, implying the possible initiation of an infringement proceedings against Italy.
In order to avoid such problems, Law Decree dated 30 December 2016, no 244. (so-called “Milleproroghe”) has been converted to restore the mistakenly abolished obligation. However, this regulatory action does not appear to be completely consistent with the system.
For further information, contact Mario Spera.