Overview of tax law decisions of the Swiss Federal Administrative Court published between August 21 - 27, 2023:
- Judgment of 15 August 2023 (A-5045/2021): VAT; input tax deduction reduction (tax periods 2014-2015); In the present case, the complainant received contributions from OFCOM, paid in the form of a granted reduction on the delivery prices of subscribed daily newspapers by Swiss Post. It is undisputed that these contributions are subsidies passed on (by Swiss Post) within the meaning of Art. 18 para. 2 let. a VAT Act in conjunction with Art. 30 para. 1 VAT Act. Art. 30 para. 1 MWSTV. It is also undisputed that the complainant must therefore proportionately reduce its input tax deductions in application of Art. 33 para. 2 VAT Act (cf. E. 2.5 above). The Federal Administrative Court examines whether the method applied by the FTA for the calculation of the input tax deduction reduction in the present case is appropriate. The Federal Administrative Court sees no indications that the FTA did not act within its discretion in the reduction of the input tax deduction it applied. Moreover, the numerical calculation is not disputed. The complainant's request that the contributions to press promotion recorded as object-related subsidies should be qualified as subsidies granted to it, which entail an input tax reduction in the ratio of these funds to the total turnover, is rejected.
- Judgment of 15 August 2023 (A-5046/2021): Value added tax; VAT group; input tax deduction (tax periods 2014-2018); The present decision concerns the VAT group of which the complainant from judgment A-5045/2021 is a member. This decision also deals with the factual correctness of the input tax reductions. For details regarding the considerations of the Federal Administrative Court, reference is therefore made here to the summary of A-5045/2021 (above). The appeal is dismissed.
- Judgment of 3 August 2023 (A-5065/2021): Customs duties; In the present case, the issue was the subsequent subjecting of the complainant to customs and import taxes, as well as the default interest for these claims, which were set in the contested decision. According to the customs investigation, the complainant imported or had imported a total of 39,305.90 kg of gross beef into Switzerland between September 2016 and January 24, 2019, without reporting this. The statements of the lower instance, which justifies the short processing time (1 day) of the complainant's dossier with its knowledge of the dossier, do not give rise to any criticism. Taking into account the price of the goods per kilogram and the customs duty, the difference is in favor of the complainant; partial approval of the complaint of the duty payer.
- Judgment of August 9, 2023 (A-1299/2023): MWST (2016-2020): Request for reconsideration; appeal decision dated February 15, 2023. As there are no grounds for reconsideration, the appeal is dismissed.
Administrative assistance (incl. updates/re-publications):
Decisions are listed chronologically by publication date.
