Court of Cassation clarifies VAT Assessment Notification Rules

On January 17^th 2019 (ruling No. 08/2019, docket No.4067), the Court of Cassation (Cour de Cassation) ruled that the Luxembourg VAT Authorities (Administration de l’Enregistrement, des Domaines et de la TVA) could validly continue to notify VAT assessments to a corporate taxpayer’s former registered seat, despite the publication of the termination of its domiciliation agreement, to the extent the taxpayer had not previously informed the authorities of a change of its address.

In the case at hand, the Luxembourg VAT Authorities sent VAT assessments to the address which a corporate taxpayer had previously indicated, to the relevant tax office, as corresponding to its registered seat. However, prior to the notification of these assessments, the company’s domiciliation agreement had been terminated by the service provider and the termination had been duly published in the Luxembourg register of commerce and companies (the “RCS”). The company’s insolvency receiver challenged the validity of the notification, arguing that the authorities had to take into account the publication in the RCS and could thus no longer use an address which they had to know was incorrect. Both the Luxembourg-City District Court (Tribunal d’arrondissement de et à Luxembourg) and the Court of Appeal (Cour d’appel) decided in favour of the taxpayer.

The Court of Cassation however overturned these rulings and recalled the taxpayer’s statutory duty to inform the VAT authorities of any change of the address of its domicile, residence or registered seat. This obligation, read together with the provision in the Luxembourg VAT law, dealing with the notification of VAT assessments and specifying that said notification can be made either to the taxpayer’s domicile, residence, registered seat or to the address, which the taxpayer previously communicated to the authorities, needs – according to the Supreme Court - to be interpreted as allowing the authorities to validly choose to use the address known to them, as long as they are not informed by the taxpayer of any changes.