Importing into Germany?
The VAT and EORI you actually need.

Why importing into Germany creates a VAT obligation

For a foreign company, German VAT is triggered by what you do with goods in Germany, not by how much you sell. The moment you import goods into Germany or hold stock in a German warehouse, you have a German VAT obligation, and it starts with the first euro. There is no small-business turnover threshold for a company that is not established in Germany.

That is different from the distance-selling rules many sellers know. The €10,000 EU threshold applies to cross-border B2C sales; it does not apply to storing or importing goods in a country. Stock in a German warehouse means a German registration, full stop.

The three numbers, and who issues each

Importers routinely confuse three separate German numbers. They come from three different authorities and do three different jobs:

A German VAT registration gives you the first two. The EORI is a separate customs registration. You can hold a VAT registration without an EORI, and an EORI without trading: they are not the same thing, and one does not include the other.

When you need an EU EORI

You need your own EORI only where German customs is responsible for issuing you one, which for a company established outside the EU means it has its own staff and premises in Germany, or it is filing its own first customs declaration. Stock held for you in an Amazon or 3PL warehouse is not an establishment, so for most foreign sellers the answer is that no German EORI is available and none is needed.

You may not need your own EORI when someone else is the declarant, for example a freight forwarder, a carrier, or a marketplace that imports the goods on your behalf and is named as the importer. In that case the import is cleared under their EORI, not yours.

If you are not sure which case is yours, the 60-second EORI check walks you through it and tells you whether you need to apply.

Import VAT, and reclaiming it

When goods enter Germany, German import VAT (Einfuhrumsatzsteuer) is due at the border, normally 19 percent on the customs value. The good news for a registered business: import VAT is reclaimable as input VAT on your German VAT return, the same way you reclaim VAT on a domestic purchase.

So for a VAT-registered importer, import VAT is usually a cash-flow timing item, not a final cost. The catch is the word registered: you need the German VAT registration in place to reclaim it. Importing without registering first means paying import VAT you cannot recover at all: there is no German VAT return to deduct it through for that period, and no separate refund to pursue. Why the order matters.

Selling across the EU after you import: OSS

Once your goods are in Germany and you start shipping B2C to consumers in other EU countries, a second question appears: register in every destination country, or file one return? Above €10,000 of EU-wide B2C sales if you are established in the EU, and from the first such sale if you are not, the Union One-Stop-Shop (OSS), filed through Germany, lets you cover all 27 countries on one quarterly return, no country-by-country registration. It sits on top of your German registration. See how OSS through Germany works.

What has to be in place before your first shipment, and in what order

Most of what goes wrong here is sequencing, not paperwork. Each item below depends on the one above it, and only one of them has a queue you cannot skip.

1. Decide who is the importer of record. Everything else follows from this. The declarant is the party that files the declaration and whose EORI is used; the importer is the party whose goods they are and who bears the import VAT (Einfuhrumsatzsteuer). For a non-EU seller these are normally two different companies. If that is your company, the rest of this list is yours. If your supplier or a partner imports in their own name, it is theirs.
2. Start the German VAT registration. This is the long pole, so start it first. The tax office takes roughly four to eight weeks from submission of your tax registration questionnaire (Fragebogen zur steuerlichen Erfassung), and nothing shortens that. Holding stock in a German warehouse creates the obligation from the first euro, so the number needs to exist by the time your goods land, not after.
3. Get the EORI sorted. If your company is established in the EU, the EORI issued by your own country is valid across the whole EU including Germany, and you do not need a German one. If your company is outside the EU, you register an EORI in the first member state where you lodge a customs declaration, which can be Germany.
4. Register in the packaging register (LUCID) yourself. Required before your first German sale if you send packaged goods to consumers here. It is free, and by law it is strictly personal (§35 VerpackG), so no provider can do it for you, including us. After registering you contract a dual system for the recycling licence.
5. Give your marketplace or store the German VAT number. Marketplaces need a valid number on file to keep your account selling, so this is usually the step that turns the paperwork into revenue.

The complete German cost picture, including what we do not charge for

If you are setting your retail prices, you need every German-side cost, not only the ones we invoice. Here is the whole list, with who you actually pay.

What Vaytax does, and what we don't

Vaytax sets up and files the tax and registration side:

1. German VAT registration: we prepare your tax registration questionnaire (Fragebogen zur steuerlichen Erfassung), get you the Steuernummer and USt-IdNr, and handle all Finanzamt correspondence.
2. EU EORI application: where German customs is responsible for issuing you one, meaning your company has its own staff and premises in Germany, we file the application (the Beantragung) for you. Most sellers do not need their own EORI at all.
3. Ongoing filing: your monthly UStVA and annual return, with the import VAT reclaimed, reviewed and filed by a licensed German tax advisor.

How to start

1. Check what you need. The 60-second EORI check tells you whether you need your own EORI, and the VAT check confirms the registration.
2. Register for German VAT with Vaytax (€1,499/year all-in with registration included, or €99/month if you already have a German VAT number).
3. Add the EU EORI application only if your company has its own staff and premises in Germany (€199 one-time). Otherwise your forwarder declares as your indirect representative and no EORI of yours is needed.