7.11.2009   

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 267/29

1.

What are the characteristics of an exempt service that has ‘the effect of transferring funds and entail[sl changes in the legal and financial situation’?

In particular:

2.

Does the exemption in Article 13B(d)(3) of the Sixth Directive (1) for ‘transactions concerning payments [or] transfers’ apply to a service of obtaining and processing payments by credit and debit cards, such as those performed by the taxpayer in the present case? In particular, where the transmission of settlement files at the end of each day by the taxpayer has the effect of automatically causing the customer's account to be debited and the taxpayer's account to be credited, will those services fall within the scope of Article 13B(d)(3)?

3.

Does the answer to Question 2 depend on whether the taxpayer itself obtains authorisation codes for onward transmission or obtains those codes through the agency of its acquiring bank?

4.

Does the exemption in Article 13B(d)(l) of the Sixth Directive for ‘the negotiation of credit’ apply to services such as those offered by the taxpayer in the present case in relation to credit card payments, whereby as a result of those services the customer's credit card account is debited with further amounts of credit?

5.

Does the exemption for ‘transactions concerning payments [or] transfers’ apply to services of accepting and processing payments made using third party agents, such as those offered by the taxpayer through the Post Office and PayPoint in the present case?

6.

Does the exemption for ‘transactions concerning payments [or] transfers’ apply to services of obtaining and processing payments made by cheque sent to the taxpayer or his agent, which payments have to be processed by the taxpayer and its bank?

7.

Does the exemption for ‘transactions concerning payments [or] transfers’ apply to services, such as those offered by the taxpayer in the present case, of receiving and processing payments made over the counter at a bank for credit, through the banking system, to the taxpayer's bank account?

8.

What particular factors have to be taken into account when deciding whether a charge (such as the payment handling charge in the present case) that is applied by a taxpayer to its customer in respect of the customer's choice to make payment to the taxpayer using a particular payment method, and which is individually identified in the contractual document and separately itemised in invoices issued to customers, is a separate supply for VAT purposes?