Supreme Court rules that marketing services do not create VAT fixed establishment

On the matter of fixed establishment, Greek Supreme Court had consistently ruled in the past, contrary to relevant CJEU case law, that fixed establishment may be created even when the human and technical resources of a Greek subsidiary provide only ancillary services to a foreign affiliate that are necessary for the performance of the foreign entity’s main activity.

However in the cases handled by our tax litigation team, the Supreme Court, accepting our relevant argumentation, wholly reversed its position and narrowed its definition of fixed establishment, ruling that the human and technical resources of the Greek subsidiary should be placed at the disposal of the foreign entity, in order to perform the latter’s main activity in Greece, thus removing ancillary services from the definition of fixed establishment. Therefore, marketing services provided by a Greek subsidiary do not create a fixed establishment for the foreign recipient entity.

Source Zepos & Yannopoulos

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