OSS registration guide for EU VAT (2026)

Who needs OSS: the EUR 10,000 threshold

The trigger is a single EU-wide threshold of EUR 10,000 net of VAT per calendar year. It covers the combined total of your intra-EU B2C distance sales of goods plus telecommunications, broadcasting and electronic (TBE) services to consumers in other member states — not per country, but all cross-border EU consumer sales added together. Below that figure, a business established in one member state that ships from that same state may keep charging its home-country VAT rate and reporting everything in its normal domestic return. Checked 2026-07 against the European Commission's OSS portal.

Once you cross the threshold, the place of supply shifts to the customer's country: every subsequent eligible sale must carry the destination country's VAT rate, including the sale that tipped you over. The destination-VAT obligation then applies for the remainder of that calendar year and for the whole of the following year. At that point you have two options — register for VAT in each country you sell into, or register once for OSS and declare it all in one quarterly return.

Two groups never get the threshold at all. Sellers not established in the EU must charge destination VAT from their first cross-border B2C sale. The same applies to EU sellers who dispatch from stock held in more than one member state (the classic Amazon FBA Pan-EU setup) — the threshold only exists for businesses established in a single member state shipping from that state. You can also opt into OSS voluntarily below the threshold and charge destination VAT from the start; note that this choice binds you for two calendar years.

Union scheme vs non-Union scheme

The Union scheme is the one most sellers mean by OSS. It is open to businesses established in the EU and covers intra-EU B2C distance sales of goods plus B2C services supplied in member states where you are not established. It is also open to non-EU businesses for distance sales of goods dispatched from within the EU — for example a UK or US seller shipping from a fulfilment warehouse in Germany or Poland uses the Union scheme for those goods.

The non-Union scheme is only for businesses with no establishment in the EU, and it covers B2C services only — goods are excluded. A non-EU seller who sells both services and EU-warehoused goods can end up registered in both schemes in parallel. There is also a third scheme, the Import One Stop Shop (IOSS), for goods shipped from outside the EU in consignments up to EUR 150 — that one files monthly and has its own registration and intermediary rules, covered in our separate IOSS registration guide.

One rule that surprises people: OSS is all-or-nothing per scheme. You register in one single member state, and the scheme then applies to ALL your eligible supplies in ALL member states of consumption. You cannot use OSS for France and a local VAT registration for Italy for the same type of supply.

How to register, step by step

First, determine your member state of identification (MSI). An EU-established business has no choice: it is the country where your business is established. A non-EU business using the non-Union scheme may pick any member state. A non-EU business using the Union scheme for EU-warehoused goods registers in a member state from which its goods are dispatched.

Second, apply through the MSI's national tax portal — there is no central EU registration site. Examples checked 2026-07: Germany uses the BZSt online portal (BOP), Spain uses Agencia Tributaria form 035, Ireland uses ROS. You need an existing domestic VAT identification number first. The application asks for company details, VAT ID, bank details, any foreign VAT numbers you already hold, warehouses or fixed establishments in other member states, and whether you sell through electronic interfaces.

Third, mind the timing. Registration normally takes effect on the first day of the calendar quarter after you apply — so an application filed mid-August starts on 1 October. There is one exception: if you have already made your first qualifying cross-border supply, you can notify the MSI by the 10th day of the month following that first supply and the registration is backdated to the date of the supply. The practical rule for growing sellers: register in the quarter before you expect to cross EUR 10,000, not after the fact.

Quarterly OSS returns: deadlines, payment, records

Union and non-Union OSS returns follow calendar quarters and are filed electronically in your MSI's portal. The return breaks your B2C sales down by member state of consumption and VAT rate; you make one consolidated payment to the MSI, which redistributes it to each country. Both the return and the payment are due by the end of the month following the quarter — and unlike many domestic regimes, the deadline is NOT shifted to the next working day when it falls on a weekend or public holiday.

A nil return is mandatory for every quarter you stay registered, even with zero cross-border sales. Corrections to a past quarter are not made by amending the old return: you include them in a later return, within three years. Repeated late filing or payment can get you excluded from the scheme, which forces you back to country-by-country registrations. Records supporting the returns must be kept for 10 years and be available electronically on request — that is longer than most domestic retention rules, so set your archive policy accordingly.

OSS vs country-by-country VAT registrations

OSS replaces the foreign VAT registrations you would otherwise need purely because you SELL to consumers in a country. It does not replace registrations triggered by STOCK. The moment your inventory sits in a warehouse in another member state — Amazon FBA Pan-EU or CEE, or any third-party fulfilment centre — you need a local VAT registration there regardless of OSS: the arrival of your own goods is a reportable intra-Community movement, and domestic sales shipped from that warehouse to customers in the same country go in the LOCAL return, not the OSS return.

That is why most growing marketplace sellers run a hybrid: home VAT registration, plus local registrations in each storage country, plus one OSS registration for cross-border B2C sales. Example: a German seller on Pan-EU FBA with stock in Poland, Czechia and France keeps local registrations in those three countries; a sale from the Polish warehouse to an Austrian consumer goes in the German OSS return, while a sale from the Polish warehouse to a Polish consumer goes in the Polish domestic return.

Skipping OSS can still make sense in two cases: your EU sales are heavily B2B (OSS is B2C only), or you incur significant local input VAT — an OSS return cannot deduct input VAT, which must instead be recovered through local returns or the EU VAT refund procedure.

What OSS registration and filing costs

Registering for OSS itself is free — no member state charges a government fee, and the quarterly filing through the national portal is free too. The real cost is operational: applying the correct destination VAT rate for every consumer country (EU standard rates ranged roughly 17 to 27 percent as of 2026-07), keeping rates current, converting currencies, and reconciling marketplace settlement reports against the return.

If you outsource, ranges checked 2026-07: a one-off OSS registration handled by an agent typically runs EUR 100 to 300 (hellotax, for example, listed EUR 149), and ongoing preparation plus filing roughly EUR 40 to 150 per month depending on order volume and whether the provider files or only prepares. Full-service EU VAT packages that bundle OSS with several local FBA-country registrations commonly land at EUR 1,000 to 3,000+ per year. If you are a single-country seller comfortably below EUR 10,000, doing nothing beyond your home VAT return remains legal and free.

What changes in July 2028 (ViDA)

The VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA) package, formally adopted on 11 March 2025, expands OSS significantly from 1 July 2028 under its single-VAT-registration pillar. The headline change for e-commerce sellers is a new OSS module for movements of your own stock between member states — the main reason FBA sellers need multiple local registrations today. Domestic B2C supplies by non-established sellers also move into OSS, and the call-off stock simplification is abolished.

Practical takeaway as of 2026-07: if warehousing is the only reason you hold registrations in several countries, that burden should drop substantially from mid-2028 — but the current rules apply until then, so do not deregister anything early.

Sources

European Commission VAT One Stop Shop portal (vat-one-stop-shop.ec.europa.eu) — schemes, registration and declare-and-pay rules. Your Europe (europa.eu/youreurope) — portals and the 10-year record rule. EC ViDA page (taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu) and vatcalc.com — the July 2028 changes. Marosa (marosavat.com) and amavat (amavat.eu) — threshold conditions and the FBA stock interaction. Provider pricing at hellotax.com. All figures checked 2026-07; rates and fees change, so use the linked calculators for current numbers.

Check your specific case

• VAT OSS threshold calculator
• EORI number registration checker

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