You formed your French company from abroad, the Kbis (the official registration certificate issued by the greffe, the clerk’s office of the commercial court) arrived, clients are waiting, and you start invoicing. Then a German customer checks your VAT number on VIES (the VAT Information Exchange System, the European Commission database that confirms whether an EU VAT number is valid) and tells you the number comes back as invalid. Or your French supplier refuses to zero-rate an intra-Community supply because your number cannot be verified. Or the first letter from the service des impôts des entreprises (the SIE, the corporate tax office that manages your file) arrives with a demand for late returns. This guide explains, for a foreign founder running a French company from outside France, how the French VAT number is attributed, how to activate it on VIES, which VAT regime applies to you, how to invoice and deduct correctly across borders, and how to fix an inactive number or a late filing before penalties accumulate.

French acronyms used below are explained at first use: Kbis (company identity certificate), greffe (commercial court clerk), SIREN (the nine-digit company identifier issued by INSEE, the national statistics institute), SIRET (SIREN plus five digits identifying each establishment), BODACC (Bulletin officiel des annonces civiles et commerciales, the gazette publishing company registrations), URSSAF (the body collecting social contributions, mentioned only to distinguish it from tax), CGI (Code général des impôts, the French Tax Code), SIE (corporate tax office), and DES/ESL (the déclaration européenne de services and état récapitulatif, summary statements for intra-EU transactions).

This article builds on the companion pillar guide for foreign founders, Setting Up a Company in France as a Foreign Founder: Bank Account, Kbis, VAT and Your First Hire, which covers the full incorporation sequence. The present guide goes deeper on one step of that sequence that generates the most urgent messages from abroad: the VAT number that exists on paper but does not work in real transactions.

I. Your French VAT number exists but does not work yet: attribution, VIES activation and the right regime

A. When France must give you a VAT number and where to check that it works

Every company registered in France receives a SIREN number when the guichet unique (the single online filing portal operated by the INPI, the national industrial property institute, through which all business registrations pass since January 2023) transmits the file to INSEE. The VAT number, however, is attributed by the tax administration after registration, and its format is fixed: the country code FR, a two-digit computer key, and your nine-digit SIREN. The official business-registration service describes it exactly this way and explains that the number identifies each business liable for VAT within the European Union. Before doing anything else, read that official page and confirm the structure of your own number against it.

The scope of French VAT is set by Article 256 of the CGI, which provides: “Sont soumises à la taxe sur la valeur ajoutée les livraisons de biens et les prestations de services effectuées à titre onéreux par un assujetti agissant en tant que tel.” In other words, once your French company supplies goods or services for consideration as a taxable person, its transactions fall in principle inside VAT. That is why the number matters from the first invoice, not from the first profitable year.

Immediately after incorporation, every taxable person must report to the administration. Article 286 of the CGI provides: “Toute personne assujettie à la taxe sur la valeur ajoutée doit : 1° Dans les quinze jours du commencement de ses opérations, souscrire au bureau désigné par un arrêté une déclaration conforme au modèle fourni par l’administration.” For a foreign founder, the practical point is sharp: the fifteen-day clock runs from the start of operations, not from the day you finally move to France or open the bank account. A company that invoices in October but declares its activity in December is already late, and that delay explains many inactive numbers.

Attribution is not activation. The SIE creates your intra-Community VAT number in its systems, but the number becomes usable in cross-border trade only when it is published as valid in VIES. Between attribution and VIES visibility, days or weeks can pass, and files with inconsistencies (address mismatch between the Kbis and the tax file, director identification incomplete, guichet unique file still being processed) stay invisible longer. During that window, your number is real but unverifiable, which is exactly the situation foreign founders describe as “my VAT number does not work”.

Run three checks from abroad before your first cross-border invoice. First, verify your SIREN and address on the official company register (Annuaire des entreprises) and on your Kbis: if the registered office (siège social) shown to the tax office differs from the one on the Kbis, correct it through the guichet unique first, because the SIE works from the registered data. Second, ask the SIE by secure message through your professional tax account (espace professionnel on impots.gouv.fr) for written confirmation that the intra-Community number is attributed and active; keep that message as proof. Third, test the number yourself on the European Commission VIES validation page and save a dated screenshot of each test. A customer who refuses a zero rate will be convinced by a dated VIES printout, not by your assurance that the number “should” work.

If VIES returns your number as invalid, do not invoice as if it were valid. For sales inside France, charge French VAT normally and pay it over; the problem is cross-border treatment, not domestic collection. For supplies to customers in other EU Member States, warn the customer in writing that your number is pending VIES publication and agree in the contract who bears the cost if the zero rate cannot be applied immediately. Some founders discover the issue only when a customer withholds payment on a large invoice; a one-paragraph contract clause allocating that risk costs nothing and prevents a cash crisis.

The second structural question is the place of your transactions. Article 259 of the CGI provides: “Le lieu des prestations de services est situé en France : 1° Lorsque le preneur est un assujetti agissant en tant que tel et qu’il a en France : a) Le siège de son activité économique”, and continues with the mirror situations for establishments, domicile and non-taxable customers. The place of supply decides whether you charge French VAT, whether the customer self-assesses it, or whether no French VAT applies at all. A founder in Dubai billing a taxable client in Berlin for services used in Germany is not automatically making a French VAT transaction simply because the company is French. Map each revenue stream (French clients, EU taxable clients, EU private clients, non-EU clients) to its place rule before choosing invoice wording, because the wrong mention on the invoice is itself a ground for reassessment.

B. Which VAT regime applies to your company: standard liability, import self-assessment and the small-business exception

The default position of a French operating company (SAS, société par actions simplifiée, or SARL, société à responsabilité limitée) that carries out taxable transactions is full VAT liability: it charges VAT, files returns, and deducts input VAT under the conditions of the statute. Your returns follow Article 287 of the CGI, which provides: “Tout redevable de la taxe sur la valeur ajoutée identifié conformément aux dispositions combinées des articles 286 ter et 286 ter A est tenu de remettre au service des impôts dont il dépend et dans le délai fixé par arrêté une déclaration conforme au modèle prescrit par l’administration”. In practice, new companies file under the simplified regime with quarterly or annual rhythm unless they opt for the normal monthly regime, and the SIE assigns the rhythm when the file is created. From abroad, the operational consequence is that you need a French-qualified accountant (expert-comptable) connected to your professional tax account from month one, because deadlines run even when you receive no paper mail at the registered office.

Imports deserve separate attention because foreign founders very often source hardware, components or stock outside the EU. Since the 2022 reform, import VAT is no longer paid at the border and then reclaimed; it is self-assessed on the VAT return. Article 1695 of the CGI provides: “La taxe sur la valeur ajoutée est déclarée et perçue lorsqu’elle devient exigible, pour les opérations suivantes : 1° Les importations pour lesquelles le redevable est une personne non assujettie et non identifiée”, and its paragraphs II and III organise the general self-assessment authorisation for taxable persons established in EU customs territory. A recent illustration shows why the paperwork matters: in a dispute between an importer of electronic components and its carrier, which had paid import VAT at the border and re-invoiced it, the Rennes Court of Appeal held that the importer held a self-assessment authorisation issued under those very paragraphs, so that “L’autorisation est donnée conformément aux II et III de l’article 1695 du code général des impôts”, and concluded that “En conséquence, les factures relatives à la TVA à l’importation ne sont pas dues par la société” (Rennes Court of Appeal, 3rd Commercial Chamber, 11 February 2025, RG No. 24/02101, Cordon Electronics v. Fedex Express FR, official record at https://www.courdecassation.fr/decision/67ac393e3997245d88909d3d). The lesson for a founder abroad is concrete: obtain the self-assessment position on your file, inform the carrier and customs representative (représentant en douane enregistré) in writing with proof of receipt, and keep the authorisation with the accounting file. A carrier that was told only orally will keep paying VAT at the border and billing you for it, exactly as in that case.

The mirror situation is the foreign supplier billing your French company. Article 283 of the CGI provides: “La taxe sur la valeur ajoutée doit être acquittée par les personnes qui réalisent les opérations imposables”, then adds the exception that matters to you: “lorsqu’une livraison de biens ou une prestation de services mentionnée à l’ article 259 A est effectuée par un assujetti établi hors de France, la taxe est acquittée par l’acquéreur, le destinataire ou le preneur qui agit en tant qu’assujetti et qui dispose d’un numéro d’identification à la taxe sur la valeur ajoutée en France”. That is the reverse charge (autoliquidation): when a non-French supplier bills your French taxable company, in many cases it is your company that declares and simultaneously deducts the VAT, with no cash movement if the deduction is full. Your supplier’s invoice must then carry the correct wording and no French VAT, and your return must show both the collected and the deductible amounts. Founders who book such invoices as simple “no VAT” purchases under-declare on both lines and create an adjustment YEARS later.

Small turnovers can fall under the small-business exception (franchise en base de TVA), under which the company bills without VAT and files no VAT returns while it stays below statutory ceilings. The ceilings differ by activity (sales of goods versus services) and are amended periodically, so verify the current figures on the version of the statute in force on your invoicing date rather than relying on a blog post from a previous year. The strategic warning matters more than the numbers: a company under the exception cannot deduct input VAT at all, which punishes founders with heavy French start-up costs (fit-out works, equipment, stock). If you invest 80,000 euros in a Paris workshop while billing without VAT, that input VAT is lost. Conversely, opting out of the exception to recover input VAT commits you to charge VAT on every invoice, including to private customers who cannot recover it. Model both paths with your accountant before the first invoice, because the option, once exercised, locks the rhythm of your filings.

Two traps specific to founders living abroad close this section. First, the professional tax account is the only reliable channel: the SIE sends notices, demands and VAT numbers electronically, and a director who never opens the account discovers the inactive number through a customer instead of through the administration. Appoint, from incorporation, the person who checks that account weekly (you, your accountant with a mandate, or both) and keep the mandate letter. Second, the registered office address must be capable of receiving registered mail: domiciliation companies (sociétés de domiciliation) forward mail with delay, and some founders learn of a VAT deactivation from a bailiff rather than from the SIE. Ask your domiciliation provider for the forwarding rhythm in writing and keep a French telephone contact able to receive a verification call from the tax office.

II. Invoice, deduct and repair from abroad: cross-border invoices, input VAT and late filings

A. How to invoice and deduct correctly while your customers and suppliers are in several countries

Invoicing is a legal act, not a template. Article 289 of the CGI provides: “Tout assujetti est tenu de s’assurer qu’une facture est émise, par lui-même, ou en son nom et pour son compte, par son client ou par un tiers”, and continues with the cases (supplies to other taxable persons, distance sales, self-billing) in which an invoice is compulsory. Each invoice must show your full company name, registered office, SIREN/RCS number (Registre du commerce et des sociétés, the trade register, with the city of the greffe), intra-Community VAT number, the customer’s VAT number for intra-EU supplies, dates, description, price, VAT rate and amount, and, where the reverse charge applies, the statutory wording referring to it. From abroad, the most common defect is the missing or wrong VAT number line: software configured with the SIREN instead of the FR number, or with a number copied before the key was attributed. Review the first ten invoices manually before automating anything.

For each customer category, apply a distinct treatment. Sales to French taxable customers: charge French VAT at the applicable rate (standard 20 percent for most goods and services, reduced rates only where the statute expressly provides), show the VAT amount, and declare it. Supplies of goods to taxable customers in other EU Member States who give you a valid VIES number: in principle exempt in France with taxation in the customer’s State (intra-Community supply), on condition that you prove the number was valid at the time of supply and that the goods actually left France (transport documents, CMR consignment notes, customer receipt). Services to EU taxable customers: in most business-to-business cases, the place of supply is the customer’s State under Article 259, so you invoice without French VAT with the reverse-charge wording and file a DES declaration listing the customer and the amount. Sales to EU private individuals: as a rule, you charge French VAT (with distance-selling thresholds and the One-Stop Shop scheme, OSS, the EU portal for declaring distance sales, where relevant). Sales to non-EU customers: exports outside the EU are in principle exempt with right of deduction, on condition of customs proof of exit. One company can use all five treatments in the same month; the accounting system must therefore tag every customer with a VAT status verified on VIES at onboarding and re-verified periodically.

Deduction is where foreign founders lose the most money through delay. Article 271 of the CGI provides: “La taxe sur la valeur ajoutée qui a grevé les éléments du prix d’une opération imposable est déductible de la taxe sur la valeur ajoutée applicable à cette opération.” The right exists, but it expires. The Court of Cassation recently restated the deadline in a case about VAT on invoices received between 2000 and 2003 and paid in 2012, where a refund claim had been rejected as time-barred: “Vu les articles 271, I du code général des impôts, 208 et 242-0 A à 242-0 G de l’annexe II du même code”, the Court held that “le client d’un assujetti, lorsque cet assujetti a opté pour le paiement de la TVA d’après les débits, doit déclarer la TVA déductible figurant sur les factures dans le mois de leur réception et au plus tard le 31 décembre de la deuxième année suivante”, adding that “A défaut de déclaration dans ces délais, le crédit de TVA ne peut donner lieu ni à imputation ni à remboursement” (Court of Cassation, Commercial, Financial and Economic Chamber, 1 October 2025, Appeal No. J 24-14.456, Arrêt No. 495 F-D, official record at https://www.courdecassation.fr/decision/68dce211bc55f2c6aba501a5). The facts concerned a company in court-ordered liquidation, but the rule is general: input VAT not declared within the month of receipt, and at the latest by 31 December of the second following year, is permanently lost. A founder who keeps supplier invoices “for later, when the accountant is appointed” and hands over a shoebox eighteen months later is financing the Treasury.

Three deduction conditions must be satisfied together: a valid invoice in your company’s exact legal name with its VAT number, a genuine taxable use (the expense serves taxed operations, not exempt or private consumption), and timely declaration on the return. Invoices addressed to you personally, to the foreign parent company instead of the French subsidiary, or to a trade name without the legal name, do not support deduction. Entertainment, hospitality and most vehicle costs are excluded or restricted by specific provisions regardless of the invoice quality. From abroad, enforce a simple rule with every employee and contractor: no payment without an invoice that passes the three-condition test, and every invoice uploaded to the shared accounting drive within seven days with proof of payment attached.

Intra-EU declarations are the second layer founders forget. Beyond the VAT return itself, supplies of goods to EU customers require the recapitulative statement (ESL, formerly DEB for dispatches), and services to EU taxable customers require the DES, each on its own monthly calendar. A company whose VAT returns are perfect but whose ESL/DES are missing receives information requests, then estimated assessments, then a VIES deactivation proposal. Calendar these declarations with the same seriousness as the return: assign them by name to your accountant in the engagement letter (lettre de mission), and ask for monthly confirmation that return, ESL and DES were all filed, with filing receipts archived.

Document retention from abroad needs deliberate organisation. French tax law requires invoices and supporting documents to be kept for the full audit period, and the administration increasingly audits remotely by requesting electronic files. Store invoices in their original electronic form with integrity guarantees (unalterable PDF archiving or a compliant e-invoicing chain), not as re-scanned images of prints, and keep transport proof for every zero-rated intra-Community supply stapled to the invoice in the system. The e-invoicing reform (facturation électronique), whose timetable founders should track on impots.gouv.fr and economie.gouv.fr, will progressively require structured electronic invoices through certified platforms; a founder who implements compliant tooling early avoids rebuilding the archive under audit pressure.

B. Your number is inactive on VIES or your filing is late: activate, regularise and contest the surcharge

An inactive VIES number has three families of causes, and each has its own repair. First, administrative lag after incorporation: the number is attributed but not yet published. The repair is patience plus proof: confirm attribution in writing with the SIE, adjust contract wording with customers in the meantime, and re-test VIES weekly until it validates. Second, a data defect: wrong address, director identification incomplete, guichet unique file returned for correction, or the company flagged as non-trading. The repair is a correction filing through the guichet unique (change of address, completion of the beneficial-owner register, the RBE, registre des bénéficiaires effectifs, which identifies the natural persons ultimately controlling the company) followed by a message to the SIE attaching the corrected Kbis. Third, deactivation after missing returns or after the administration concluded that the company had no real activity at its declared address. The repair is substantive: file every missing return, pay or formally dispute each assessment, and, where an on-site verification was attempted, prove real occupation of the premises (lease, domiciliation contract with actual mail handling, evidence of activity). A founder who only sends angry emails while the returns stay missing remains inactive; the file reopens when the returns land.

Late or incorrect returns attract increases that stack quickly. Article 1729 of the CGI provides: “Les inexactitudes ou les omissions relevées dans une déclaration ou un acte comportant l’indication d’éléments à retenir pour l’assiette ou la liquidation de l’impôt”, and continues with the scale of increases applicable according to the gravity of the breach. On top of the principal and the increase, late-payment interest accrues monthly until full payment. From abroad, two reflexes limit the damage. File the corrective or late return spontaneously before any audit notice wherever possible: spontaneous regularisation is treated more favourably than correction after a control begins, and it stops interest from running. And never let a “zero” month go unfiled on the assumption that no activity means no return: a missing nil return is still a missing return, and the administration estimates the base when the taxpayer is silent.

When the assessment already exists, contest it in the right order. First, read the notice line by line: tax period, legal basis cited, amounts of principal, increase and interest, and the payment deadline. Second, use the administrative route: a written claim (réclamation contentieuse) to the SIE within the statutory time limit, setting out facts, law and evidence, and requesting both discharge of the unfounded part and, where appropriate, remission of penalties (remise gracieuse, a discretionary waiver the administration may grant for penalties where the taxpayer shows good faith and settles the principal). Third, if the administration rejects the claim in whole or in part, appeal to the administrative court (tribunal administratif) within the time stated in the rejection. Throughout, keep paying what is indisputably due where a stay is not granted, because interest continues to run on unpaid principal during the dispute. Founders abroad sometimes refuse all payment “on principle” while contesting; that stance converts a winnable penalty dispute into a debt spiral.

Prescription works in both directions, which the 2025 Court of Cassation ruling recalls with force: the administration loses the right to assess after the statutory period, but the taxpayer equally loses input-VAT credits never declared in time, with the Court insisting that without timely declaration “le crédit de TVA ne peut donner lieu ni à imputation ni à remboursement” (Court of Cassation, Commercial Chamber, 1 October 2025, Appeal No. J 24-14.456). Audit your own file once a year from abroad with your accountant: unclaimed input VAT older than the deadline is a known loss to book, not a future refund to hope for, and periods approaching prescription on the administration side must be handled without any acknowledgement that could reopen them. That annual review is also the moment to reconcile VIES status, ESL/DES filings, the RBE entry and the Kbis address, because the next customer check or the next SIE letter will test exactly that consistency.

Finally, organise the evidence chain a dispute will need. For every contested invoice, keep the contract, the order, proof of delivery or performance, proof of payment with bank reference, the VIES validation printout dated at the time of supply, and the transport or customs document for cross-border movements. The Rennes import-VAT case turned on emails proving the carrier knew of the self-assessment since early 2020 and on the merger record (Kbis extract) showing the two trading names were one company; without those two exhibits, the importer would have paid 34,000 euros it did not owe. From abroad, where you cannot walk into the office with a folder, the shared drive is the folder: name files by invoice number, forbid personal email accounts for company business, and require that every VAT-relevant decision (option for a regime, change of address, appointment of the accountant) exists as a dated writing.

Conclusion

A French VAT number that cannot be verified on VIES is not a technical detail; it blocks zero-rating, alarms customers and invites reassessment. Attribution through the SIE after SIREN registration, weekly VIES testing with dated proof, the correct regime choice, invoicing that follows Article 256, Article 259, Article 283 and Article 289 of the CGI, deduction declared on time under Article 271 as interpreted by the Court of Cassation on 1 October 2025, returns filed under Article 287 further to the declaration duty of Article 286, import self-assessment under Article 1695 as applied by the Rennes Court of Appeal on 11 February 2025, and increases contained under Article 1729: that is the complete chain. Run it from abroad with an accountant connected to the professional tax account, a weekly VIES test, monthly filing receipts for return, ESL and DES, and an archive where every invoice carries its proof. The founders who sleep well are not those with the cleverest structure; they are those whose number validates, whose returns are filed, and whose evidence is already in the drive when the SIE writes.