Cancellation and reissuance of an invoice does not have any impact on the VAT refund period

Background of the case

The French company Pompes Salmson SAS purchased in 2012 tooling located in Romania and filed 2012 VAT refund claim. This VAT refund application was denied by Romanian Tax Authorities due to possession of incorrect invoices. Pompes Salmson SAS did not file any appeal against this decision.

In 2015 the supplier cancelled the original invoices and issued new ones. Based on these new invoices, the company Wilo Salmson France SAS (legal successor of Pompes Salmson SAS) filed new VAT refund claim for 2015. Romanian Tax Authorities denied this application, reasoning that this VAT was already claimed in 2012.

Judgement

According to the CJEU:

• the right to deduct input VAT arises at the moment when the VAT liability with respect to the VAT that is deductible arises whereas in order to claim the input VAT deduction (and VAT refund) the taxable person must possess an invoice issued in accordance with the EU VAT Directive,
• a document cannot be regarded as an invoice in accordance with the EU VAT Directive only if it contains such omissions that does not allow the Tax Authorities to obtain information necessary for the approval of the VAT refund application – i. e. formally incomplete document cannot be automatically denied,
• for the VAT refund purposes, it is crucial when the taxable person obtained the invoice issued in accordance with the EU VAT Directive – the VAT refund application for a particular period cannot be denied only on the ground that the VAT liability arose in previous refund period; however, the invoice was issued in that particular period,
• provided the original invoices should be treated as invoices issued in accordance with the EU VAT Directive, their cancellation and reissuance performed by the supplier without any valid reason after rejecting, by the Tax Authorities, of the VAT refund claim based on these invoices, do have any impact neither on the right for VAT refund that was already claimed nor on the period for which the right should be claimed.