- The Hoge Raad (Supreme Court) addressed questions regarding VAT and the indivisibility of services.
- Article 27ga AWR and Article 11, paragraph 1, letter k, of the 1968 VAT Act were referenced.
- The case involved whether insurance and claims handling services, provided by different entrepreneurs to different clients, could be considered a single indivisible service.
- The Hoge Raad noted that the lower court can refer legal questions to the Hoge Raad for a preliminary ruling if necessary for the case decision.
- Preliminary questions should address legal issues that affect many similar cases and require a prompt answer for legal uniformity.
- According to EU Court of Justice jurisprudence, each service provided for consideration is generally considered distinct and independent for VAT purposes.
- However, a composite service consisting of multiple elements can be treated as a single economic service if one element is the main service and others are ancillary.
- The specific case did not involve a legal question but rather the application of legal rules to the facts, which is not suitable for a preliminary ruling.
- The Hoge Raad identified a legal question in the lower court’s explanation that needed answering for the case decision and for legal certainty and development.
- The lower court noted that EU jurisprudence had not yet addressed whether two services provided by different entrepreneurs to different clients could be considered a single indivisible service.
Source: uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl
Note that this post was (partially) written with the help of AI. It is always useful to review the original source material, and where needed to obtain (local) advice from a specialist.
