Excise duties

In addition to VAT, most companies are burdened with a number of excise duties. In particular, in many cases electricity and energy tax is a big cost factor. Then in certain fields there are further excise duties on goods for daily use such as tobacco, coffee, spirits and beer. These types of excise duty are levied and administered by the customs authorities.

Overview of excise duties:

Classification of excise duties

The basic principles of excise duty are uniform within the EU and stipulate which goods are subject to tax when they enter the economic cycle in the German tax territory and are then used or consumed. In the scope of this uniform EU principle there are tax planning opportunities via so-called tax suspension arrangements or exemptions. This allows, for example, production and trade to be virtually untaxed via bonded warehouses. The tax is only due when the goods are removed from the bonded warehouse. As a result products subject to excise duty are only taxed in the country where they are also consumed.

The energy tax in particular

The energy tax is the most important excise duty for companies. All energy sources are generally subject to energy tax such as coal, natural gas, petrol and also other products as far as these are used as fuel or heating fuel. There are numerous opportunities for relief (tax relief or refund possibilities) in the area of energy tax as similarly seen in the field of electricity tax and this means that careful management of this area can give a company a real competitive edge.

For example, a production company is eligible for relief when it can be verified that the taxed energy products are used in the company for the manufacturing process.

Expert support in this tax area will help you to substantially reduce costs. These cost advantages are particularly true for companies in the manufacturing industry, aviation and maritime shipping which have fixed installations for power generation and also for agricultural and forestry companies.

Our consulting services

We assist and advise you in all questions with regard to excise duty law in the following areas:

Assessment of the matters in your company relevant for excise duty law
Creation of a list of measures to reduce charges relating to excise duties
Discussion of the analysed measures and support for their implementation together with employees from your company, including support or responsibility for documents from the authorities and representation of interests in the case of disputes
In-house training, workshops and seminars
On request: recurrent reviews to ensure quality of the implemented measures.

In addition to VAT, most companies are burdened with a number of excise duties. In particular, in many cases electricity and energy tax is a big cost factor. Then, in certain fields there are further excise duties on goods for daily use such as tobacco, coffee, spirits and beer. These types of excise duty are levied and administered by the customs authorities.

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Ewald Plum

Partner

+49 711 7819 144 97

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