Section 7: Implementation, regulations regarding fines, penal provisions, transitional regulations and final provisions

§ 27b VAT inspection

(1) In order to ensure that VAT is assessed and charged on a consistent basis, officials of the tax authorities assigned to this task may enter, without prior notice and outside the scope of a field audit, the property and premises of persons, who independently carry out a commercial or professional activity, during business and working hours in order to identify matters that may be significant for the taxation process (VAT inspection). Homes may only be entered against the will of the owner in order to avert an immediate danger to public safety and order.

(2) If useful for determining matters of tax relevance, the persons affected by the VAT inspection must submit, upon request, records, accounting books, business papers and other certificates regarding the matters underlying the VAT inspection and must provide information to the officials assigned to the audit. If the documents mentioned in sentence 1 have been created using a data processing system, the auditor is entitled to view the stored data concerning the transactions subject to the VAT inspection and, where necessary for this purpose, use the data processing system upon request. This applies also to electronic invoices pursuant to § 14 paragraph 1 sentence 3 and other invoices in another electronic format.

(3) The nature of the VAT inspection may be changed, without a prior audit order (§ 196 of the Fiscal Code), into a field audit in accordance with § 193 of the Fiscal Code, if the findings determined in the VAT inspection justify this. Notification of the transition to a field audit shall be provided in writing.

(4) In the event that conditions are identified during the VAT inspection that may be important with regard to the assessment and charging of any taxes other than VAT, such an evaluation of the findings shall be permitted inasmuch as the findings would be of significance with regard to further taxation of persons referred to in paragraph 1 or of other persons.