German import VAT reform: less cash tied up at the port

SATURDAY, 19 SEPTEMBER 2026

La Conferenza dei ministri delle Finanze ha deciso il 10 settembre, ma il modello parte nel 2030. Fra la decisione e l’applicazione passano più di tre anni.

The German import VAT reform changes the method: no more payment to customs for businesses with full right of deduction. It is a cash measure, not a tax cut, and it does not take effect before 2030.

The German import VAT reform: what has been decided

The Conference of Finance Ministers of the Länder has approved the introduction of an offsetting model for value added tax on imports. The association of German seaport terminal operators welcomed it as a long-awaited step.

• Decision by the Conference of Finance Ministers: 10 September 2026
• Planned start of the new model: 1 January 2030
• Gap between the decision and its application: more than three years
• Year in which the same Conference had already recognised the need for the model: 2024
• Payment to customs required under the new model for those deducting in full: none

Today in Germany a company importing from a non-EU country pays the tax to the customs authority and recovers it later, with its periodic return. Under the offsetting model the tax will be entered in the return and simultaneously deducted as input tax, without money leaving.

It is not a discount, it is a matter of timing

Here it is worth being precise, because the news is easily read as a tax advantage and it is not one.

For a company that deducts VAT in full, import tax is already neutral in cost terms: what is paid is recovered. What is not neutral is the financial side. Between payment at customs and recovery, time passes, and during that time capital stays tied up. The offsetting model removes the outflow, it does not reduce the tax.

The difference sounds formal and is not: anyone calculating the benefit as a percentage of the value of the goods has the wrong order of magnitude. The benefit is the cost of money on the amount, for the number of days it sits still. On thin margins and high volumes it can count; on an occasional shipment barely at all.

The competitive argument, and how to weigh it

The German port association argues that the current rule penalises national terminals against European competitors, where import tax is offset directly against the credit.

It is a legitimate argument and should be attributed to whoever makes it: it is the position of an interested party, not an independent measure of how much traffic would shift. That pre-financing is a cost is a fact; how much it weighs in choosing a port against delivery times, frequencies, inland connections and handling tariffs is another question, and on that the statement brings no figures.

Then there is the calendar, the least commented and most concrete part: more than three years pass between the decision and its application. Anyone choosing a port of discharge today does so under today's rules.

What to look at now

The first point is to measure rather than estimate. It is worth calculating what the tax advanced at customs actually costs you: average amount per shipment, days before recovery, your company's cost of money. It is a calculation done once, and it tells you whether the subject concerns you at all.

The second concerns the tools already available in Italy. Regimes exist that move the moment the tax is paid — the VAT warehouse is the best known — and the right question for your adviser is not whether they exist, but whether your operations qualify and on what conditions.

The third is a caution on logistics choices. A rule taking effect in 2030 is not a reason to change port of discharge now. It is worth noting among the factors to review when it arrives, and meanwhile deciding on the parameters that count today.

With La Merce, following the German import VAT reform means telling a cash-flow advantage apart from a tax discount and measuring what it is worth to you, instead of waiting for a rule that takes effect more than three years from now.

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