Foreign founders often discover French VAT on hotel bills, trade fairs, professional advice, transport, equipment and local events only after the expense has been paid. The immediate question is practical: can the company recover that tax without creating a French subsidiary? In many cases, yes. The absence of a French subsidiary is not, by itself, a bar to a refund. The decisive questions are whether the claimant is established in France, whether it has made French transactions that trigger a VAT filing obligation, whether the French VAT was lawfully charged, and whether the expense supports activities that qualify for deduction.<\/p>\n
The procedure is not the same for a company established in the European Union and one established outside it. The filing portal, tax representative requirement, evidence, minimum claim and deadline all change. A foreign company should therefore classify its position before submitting invoices. It should also separate a genuine French VAT refund from a supplier’s billing error: tax charged when no French VAT was due is normally recovered from the supplier, not through a refund claim. This guide sets out the decision tree, the evidence file and the principal remedies, with the statutory rules and case law that a finance team can verify before filing.<\/p>\n
The first misconception is that incorporation determines the refund. A French subsidiary is a separate French legal person, with its own management, accounts and tax obligations. A foreign company can incur French business expenses without creating that entity. It may attend a trade fair, send employees to meet customers, rent equipment for a project, instruct French advisers or buy goods in France while remaining established abroad.<\/p>\n
The refund analysis instead follows the VAT system. VAT, or value added tax, is called TVA in French. The starting point is Article 271 of the French General Tax Code, or CGI (Code g\u00e9n\u00e9ral des imp\u00f4ts). It states, in the relevant deduction rule, that \u201cLa taxe sur la valeur ajout\u00e9e qui a grev\u00e9 les \u00e9l\u00e9ments du prix d’une op\u00e9ration imposable est d\u00e9ductible.\u201d In plain English, VAT charged on the components of a taxable transaction can be deductible when the statutory conditions are met. The current text is available in the official Article 271 CGI<\/a>.<\/p>\n For a foreign claimant, the refund provisions in Annex II to the CGI provide the more specific route. Article 242-0 N describes the possibility for a person established outside France to obtain a refund of French VAT on deliveries, services, acquisitions or imports used for qualifying operations. The legal starting point is the official Article 242-0 N of Annex II CGI<\/a>. The rule does not ask whether the claimant has chosen the French SAS or SARL form. It asks how the claimant is established, what it does, and how the cost is connected with an activity that gives a right of deduction.<\/p>\n Three preliminary questions should be answered in writing.<\/p>\n The French tax administration summarises the same logic on its official VAT refunds page for international businesses<\/a>. It explains that a business with no French transactions liable to VAT may request a refund of French VAT paid on business expenses, subject to the applicable conditions. The English page is useful for a foreign finance department, while the French TVA refund page<\/a> is useful when the claimant or its adviser must work with French terminology.<\/p>\n No French registration number is conclusive on its own. SIREN means the nine-digit identifier of a French entity; SIRET is the fourteen-digit identifier of an establishment; INPI is the French National Institute of Industrial Property; and RNE is the National Business Register. A Kbis is an official extract from the French commercial register. Those concepts matter when a foreign company has made a French formal filing, but a SIRET, an INPI filing or a Kbis should not be treated as a complete VAT opinion. They may show an administrative or establishment connection, while the refund decision still turns on the actual business activity and the relevant VAT rules.<\/p>\n This distinction is especially important for foreign companies that register an activity in France without opening a subsidiary. The INPI guidance on competent authorities<\/a> identifies the French tax administration, DGFiP (Direction g\u00e9n\u00e9rale des Finances publiques), as the validator for certain foreign businesses without an establishment and without employees in France. The filing channel can therefore coexist with a refund question, but the filing record does not eliminate the need to analyse where the company is actually established and what transactions it has made.<\/p>\n The cost must also be connected with a professional activity. Article 206 of Annex II to the CGI expresses the deduction-coefficient approach: the right to deduct depends on the transaction being within the scope of VAT, the tax having been borne and the expense being admitted to deduction. Its current text is available through Article 206 of Annex II CGI<\/a>. Where an expense supports both taxable and exempt activities, the company may need to claim only the appropriate proportion. A general overhead is not automatically fully refundable merely because it appears in the accounts.<\/p>\n The Conseil d’\u00c9tat, France’s highest administrative court, made this point in a VAT credit dispute. In its judgment of 7 October 2020, No. 426661, it treated certain overheads as expenses that \u201cfont partie des frais g\u00e9n\u00e9raux li\u00e9s \u00e0 l’ensemble de l’activit\u00e9 \u00e9conomique\u201d, meaning that they related to the economic activity as a whole, while the deductible proportion still had to be determined. The official decision is available at CE, 7 October 2020, No. 426661<\/a>. For a foreign claimant, that reasoning supports a disciplined allocation schedule rather than a blanket claim for every invoice.<\/p>\n The expense must also carry VAT that is genuinely due. In a case concerning a Canadian company, the Paris Administrative Court of Appeal found that French VAT had been wrongly charged on services whose place of supply was Canada. The court applied Article 242-0 P and noted that a refund application cannot cover \u201cles montants de taxe sur la valeur ajout\u00e9e factur\u00e9s par erreur\u201d. It held that the company should first approach its supplier for correction. See CAA Paris, 13 December 2024, No. 23PA02947<\/a>. This is a practical dividing line: a lawful French VAT charge belongs in a refund file; an unlawful charge belongs first in a credit note and corrected invoice request.<\/p>\n The underlying activity also matters. In a 7 December 2016 decision concerning Marriott Rewards LLC, the Conseil d’\u00c9tat examined whether payments connected with a loyalty programme were used for operations that opened a right to deduction. The official ruling, CE, 7 December 2016, No. 396460<\/a>, shows why a claimant should describe the commercial service behind each cost instead of simply attaching an expense ledger. The question is not whether the company is foreign; it is whether the cost supports qualifying operations.<\/p>\n There is a similar warning for termination payments and other amounts that look like services in an accounting system but are not consideration for an identifiable taxable supply. In CE, 21 November 2011, No. 316485<\/a>, the court held that an indemnity \u201cne constituait pas la contrepartie directe et la r\u00e9mun\u00e9ration d’une prestation individualisable\u201d. A foreign company should therefore explain the legal and commercial nature of unusual invoices, settlements or indemnities before including their VAT.<\/p>\n The second question is the claimant’s country of establishment. The European Union route is designed for a taxable person established in one Member State that seeks a refund in another Member State without being established there. Article 242-0 M of Annex II to the CGI describes the non-established EU person by reference to the absence of a seat, permanent establishment or residence in France. The official provision is Article 242-0 M CGI Annex II<\/a>.<\/p>\n For an EU-established company, the request is normally submitted electronically through the tax authority’s portal in the company’s home Member State. The home authority transmits the claim to France. Article 242-0 R provides the electronic filing and deadline rules; it can be checked at Article 242-0 R CGI Annex II<\/a>. The ordinary deadline is 30 September of the year following the period to which the claim relates. Missing the deadline is not a minor formatting defect: the claim can become inadmissible even when the underlying expense would otherwise qualify.<\/p>\n The EU route is also structured around a link between the claimant’s home-state operations and the right to deduct. Article 242-0 Q states that \u201cPour b\u00e9n\u00e9ficier d’un remboursement, un assujetti non \u00e9tabli en France doit effectuer des op\u00e9rations ouvrant droit \u00e0 d\u00e9duction dans l’Etat membre de l’Union europ\u00e9enne dans lequel il est \u00e9tabli.\u201d In English, the company must conduct operations in its home Member State that give a right to deduction. See Article 242-0 Q CGI Annex II<\/a>.<\/p>\n This does not mean that every cost must be linked to one invoice issued to a customer in the home state. It does mean that the claimant should be able to show its taxable business model, its VAT status at home and the reason why the French expense serves that model. A company with a mixed activity may need to state the deductible proportion. A company whose activity is exempt, outside the scope or not evidenced may face a substantive refusal.<\/p>\n Article 242-0 O adds the French-side condition for EU claimants: in principle, they must not have made deliveries of goods or supplies of services in France that fall outside the stated exceptions. The official text is Article 242-0 O CGI Annex II<\/a>. The exceptions and reverse-charge rules require transaction-specific review. A foreign company should not decide that it is \u201cnon-established\u201d solely because it has no office or subsidiary; a French sale, installation, event service or local stock arrangement may alter the analysis.<\/p>\n The non-EU route is separate. Article 242-0 Z quater addresses a person established outside the European Union who has no seat, permanent establishment or residence in France and has not carried out the French supplies that would take it into a VAT return route, subject to the statutory exceptions. The provision is available at Article 242-0 Z quater CGI Annex II<\/a>. The rule also refers to reciprocity: the country of establishment must grant comparable refund treatment to French businesses, subject to the conditions of the relevant framework.<\/p>\n Reciprocity is not an issue to guess from an old internet list. In CE, 13 July 2006, No. 259940<\/a>, the Conseil d’\u00c9tat examined the reciprocity safeguard and the qualifying-use requirement in a claim involving a US company. That historical decision does not establish the current eligibility of every US or other non-EU company. It does show why the claimant must check the current French administrative position and the law of its own country before treating a non-EU claim as routine.<\/p>\n For a non-EU claimant, Article 242-0 Z octies requires accreditation of a French taxable representative. A tax representative is a person or firm established in France that formally undertakes the reporting and documentary interface with the French tax administration for this procedure. The official text is Article 242-0 Z octies CGI Annex II<\/a>. The administration can require security from that representative. The mandate should specify who gathers invoices, answers information requests, receives correspondence, checks the bank details and preserves the original records.<\/p>\n Article 242-0 Z septies sets out the electronic filing, summary table and evidence rules for the non-EU route. It is available at Article 242-0 Z septies CGI Annex II<\/a>. The deadline is generally the end of the sixth month following the calendar year concerned, which means 30 June of the following year. That differs from the EU deadline of 30 September. The claim is made electronically through the accredited representative, and the claimant must be ready to provide originals or supporting records within the required period.<\/p>\n Article 242-0 Z sexies sets the minimum amounts for a non-EU request: \u20ac400 for a period of at least three months but less than a year, and \u20ac50 for a full calendar year or the final part of the year. The same thresholds are reflected in the official Article 242-0 Z sexies CGI Annex II<\/a>. For EU claims, Articles 242-0 T and 242-0 U contain the corresponding period and threshold rules: a period cannot normally be shorter than three months, the quarterly threshold is \u20ac400 and the annual threshold is \u20ac50. See Article 242-0 T<\/a> and Article 242-0 U<\/a>.<\/p>\n The thresholds concern the VAT claimed, not the gross value of the invoices. A company with \u20ac2,000 of French expenses at a 20% VAT rate has a potential VAT claim of \u20ac400 before any deduction restriction. It reaches the quarterly threshold exactly, assuming the expenses are admissible and the claim covers at least three months. A company with \u20ac1,500 of expenses at 20% has \u20ac300 of VAT, so it would normally need to wait for the annual claim unless other eligible invoices bring the quarterly claim to \u20ac400. A \u20ac50 annual minimum is not a guarantee of payment: it is only one procedural threshold, and the expense must still pass the substantive tests.<\/p>\n A good claim is built as an evidence file before the online form is opened. The finance team should make a spreadsheet with one line per invoice and at least these fields: supplier name and address, supplier French VAT number, invoice number, invoice date, net amount, VAT rate, VAT amount, currency, expense category, country, business project, employee or attendee, payment reference and deductible percentage. The French administration specifically expects invoices to identify the supplier, the customer, the date, the precise goods or services, the net price and the VAT rate. The official administrative explanation is set out by Service-Public.fr’s VAT refund guidance<\/a>.<\/p>\n The invoice must be an invoice, not just a card receipt or a booking screen. A receipt can help prove payment, but it may not identify the taxable customer or contain the VAT information required for deduction. For hotels, the company should identify the business event, attendees and business purpose, while separating private accommodation, meals for non-business guests and other non-deductible elements. For an event or trade fair, retain the exhibitor agreement, registration, badge or programme and a short note explaining the expected taxable business activity. For professional advisers, retain the engagement letter and the deliverable or matter reference.<\/p>\n The following split is practical for a foreign finance team.<\/p>\n\n
B. How do EU and non-EU routes differ before filing?<\/h3>\n
II. How should a foreign company file, prove, recover or challenge the refund?<\/h2>\n
A. Which documents, thresholds and deadlines control the claim?<\/h3>\n