New VAT Return for Norway from January 2022

When you do business in Norway and are VAT registered, you need to report VAT on periodic basis to the Norwegian Tax Administration (TA). They launch a new tax return for VAT on 1st of January 2022. This means that you must submit tax return for VAT for periods starting on and after 1st of January 2022 in the new format. For reporting periods before this date, inclusive corrections, VAT Returns must be reported in the old format.

As of January 2022, only the following old VAT forms have been replaced with the new format: RF-0002 (ordinary VAT return) and RF-0004 (primary sector). The other forms like RF-0005, RF-0009 and VOEC are planned by Tax Administration to be replaced with the new format later. This might be a requirement later in 2022, but no technical requirements or dates are given yet.

How can you submit the new VAT Return to the Tax Administration?

For SAP ERP Central Component customers and SAP S/4HANA (OP) without SAP Document and Reporting Compliance, run SAPGUI report Advance Return for Tax on Sales/Purchases (RFUMSV00) and manually enter the amounts per standard tax code in the Tax Administration portal service for VAT Return.

For SAP S/4HANA customers with SAP Document and Reporting Compliance, run VAT return, enter necessary comments, generate, and download the xml file. The xml file can be uploaded in the Tax Administration portal service for VAT Return.

Note that electronic submission, machine to machine is currently not legally mandatory.

So, what are the changes to the VAT Return?

There are quite a few changes, and some of which are as follows:

• The old form with numbered boxes is replaced by a dynamic list of tax codes and specifications
• The new VAT return repurpose the Norwegian standard tax codes from the SAF-T financial file. However, the new VAT return must not be confused with the SAF-T file. Only the standard tax codes will be repurposed, and VAT return will still be at a very aggregated level.
• Easier to provide more detailed remarks as documentation, per line in VAT return or for entire VAT return
• All corrections for reporting periods starting from January 1st, 2022, must be done as a full and complete VAT Return inclusive comments to replace already submitted VAT Return. There will be no longer possible to only submit delta as corrections.
• VAT amount to be reported as positive amount for payable taxes, and negative amount refundable taxes. Unless there is an exception of course, and VAT amount for a standard tax code will be reported with opposite sign than Tax Administration expects. If that will be the case, then this might require a comment as explanation for this exception. As earlier, all decimals are removed from reported amounts, i.e., all amounts rounded down according to Tax Administration (TA) requirements.
• Certain transactions must be reported on separate lines in VAT return as specifications (No: spesifikasjon) or supplementary information. You will need to define new SAP tax codes for each specification as a combination of specification type and VAT rate. The number of new tax codes you will need, depends on your company’s business requirements. These unique tax codes should then be mapped to each type of specification/supplementary in configuration of VAT Return. SAP recommends that you discuss with your local business and/or tax auditors to discover your company’s needs. These specifications are described in the VAT act and are related to:
  • Loss on claims (No: tap på krav)
  • VAT adjustment for capital goods (No: justering)
  • Reversal of input value added tax for capital goods (only passenger vehicles and real estate) (No: tilbakeføring av inngående merverdiavgift for kapitalvarer)
  • Withdrawals (No: uttak)

What’s next?

In addition to the new VAT Return, the Norwegian Tax Administration has also announced plans to implement a sales and purchase list in 2024. The proposal has recently been presented in a mandatory public hearing phase, and changes to the law will at earliest be passed next year, in 2022.

How to configure the new VAT Return?

Before running the VAT Return in the Run Compliance Reports app in SAP S/4HANA or SAPGUI report Advance Return for Tax on Sales/Purchases (RFUMSV00) in S/4HANA OP or ECC, you need to go through some settings.

You will find a step-by-step description of the necessary settings on SAP Help Portal as soon as the corresponding product version or Support Package has been released. Until then, please see the preliminary documentation that is attached as a PDF to the following SAP Notes 3102152 and 3112208 in SAP Support Portal.

More information

For more information about the VAT Return, see the Norwegian Tax Authorities github pages for their project:

https://skatteetaten.github.io/mva-meldingen/english

In case you need support from SAP regarding the VAT Return for Norway, open an incident on SAP Support Portal Home, under the FI-LOC-FI-NO component.

To keep updated with the latest news, please join the SAP Jam group forum for SAF-T and VAT in Norway: https://jam4.sapjam.com/groups/p9pblV2bI35Hhgad6TQwHZ/overview_page/X55M4Xw7N2syDi1K55tDrA  

Thanks for reading! I hope that the above information will help you understand all about the new VAT Return for Norway. Got any questions? Please leave a comment below or ask questions with the relevant tag in Q&A area.