VAT in Romania for foreign companies: when the obligation starts
VAT in Romania for foreign companies begins with a transaction, not with a turnover figure. A company established abroad becomes registrable the moment it carries out an operation that is taxable in Romania and that neither the customer nor a one-stop shop scheme can absorb. Registration is a precondition of that operation, not a consequence of it.
That single sentence explains most of the problems we are asked to fix. Foreign finance teams read Romania through the lens of their own country, where a small-business threshold usually gives a few months of grace. There is no such grace for a non-established company here. The first pallet of stock that lands in a Romanian fulfilment centre creates the obligation on the day it arrives.
The legal basis sits in Title VII of the Fiscal Code, notably article 316 and the articles that follow it, whose consolidated text is published by ANAF. The administrative layer — forms, filing channels, nomenclatures — sits with ANAF.
Non-established, fixed establishment, permanent establishment
Three statuses look similar in English and behave very differently in Romanian practice. Getting the classification right is the first decision, because everything downstream depends on it.
| Status | What it means | VAT consequence | Issues through e-Factura |
|---|---|---|---|
| Non-established, VAT registered | Foreign company with a Romanian VAT number and no local resources | Files Romanian VAT returns for its Romanian operations | No — reports its B2B invoices, in parallel with ordinary invoicing |
| Fixed establishment | Sufficient permanence plus human and technical resources in Romania | Treated as established for VAT; local rules apply in full | Yes |
| Permanent establishment | A direct-tax concept; triggers Romanian corporate income tax | Often, but not automatically, accompanied by a fixed establishment | Depends on the VAT status |
| Romanian subsidiary (SRL) | A separate Romanian legal person | Ordinary Romanian taxpayer from incorporation | Yes |
A fixed establishment is a question of fact: whether the structure in Romania has enough permanence, staff and technical means to receive and use services or to make supplies. A leased warehouse operated entirely by a third-party logistics provider usually does not create one. An office with staff who negotiate and conclude local business usually does. The distinction is worth settling in writing before the first invoice rather than during an inspection, because it decides whether you issue through RO e-Factura or only report your B2B invoices there, and whether Romanian corporate tax enters the picture.
Where a permanent establishment does arise, the direct-tax consequences are covered separately under taxation of non-residents.
The operations that trigger Romanian VAT registration
| Situation | Romanian VAT registration |
|---|---|
| Stock held in a Romanian warehouse or fulfilment centre | Required |
| Local supply of goods from Romanian stock to a Romanian customer | Required |
| Transfer of your own goods from another member state into Romania | Required |
| Intra-Community acquisition of goods in Romania | Required |
| Supply of goods with installation or assembly in Romania | Required |
| Construction or installation work on Romanian real estate | Required in most configurations |
| Distance sales to Romanian consumers outside the one-stop shop | Required |
| Distance sales declared entirely through the one-stop shop | Not required for those sales |
| B2B services taxable in Romania where the customer accounts for the VAT | Generally not required, reverse charge applies |
The border between the last three rows is where most advisory work sits. A service supplied to a Romanian business is normally handled by that business under the reverse charge, and no registration follows. The moment goods are physically stored in Romania, the reverse charge stops being available for the local sale, and registration becomes unavoidable. Marketplace fulfilment programmes that reposition stock across borders automatically are the most common way a seller becomes registrable without having decided anything. The mechanics for online sellers are set out in the guide to e-commerce VAT in Romania.
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Direct registration or fiscal representative
Article 316 of the Fiscal Code sets two routes, and the choice is not free — it follows the country of establishment.
| Where the company is established | Route | Fiscal representative |
|---|---|---|
| Another EU member state | Direct registration, form 015 | Optional |
| Outside the European Union | Through a Romanian fiscal representative | Mandatory |
| With a Romanian fixed establishment | Registration follows the establishment | Not applicable |
Under direct registration, the EU company is registered in its own name, keeps the liability itself, and deals with ANAF either directly or through a mandated agent. This is the lighter option and the one worth taking wherever it is available. The full procedure, including form 015 and the supporting file, is described on the page about VAT registration for non-residents.
For companies established outside the European Union, a Romanian fiscal representative is compulsory. Point 89 paragraph (4) of the Methodological Norms to article 316 Fiscal Code provides that the representative, once accepted by the tax authority, “is bound, in terms of the rights and obligations concerning value added tax, for all the operations for which it has been mandated”. In practice it files the VAT return for those operations and pays the VAT due, and ANAF addresses the representative for that VAT while the mandate lasts — which is why the appointment involves genuine scrutiny of the business, its counterparties and its cash position rather than a signature on a mandate. That relationship is described on the page about fiscal representation.
Registration itself runs through form 015, the declaration used for taxpayers with no fixed establishment in Romania. Company documents from the home register are filed in authorised Romanian translation, apostilled where required. About one week from a complete file is the normal outcome; assembling the file, which depends on the home country, is usually the slower part.
Not sure which route applies? Send us your country of establishment and where your goods are held. We reply within one business day with the filings you owe. Ask for a written assessment
Romanian VAT rates: 21% and 11%
| Rate | Applies to |
|---|---|
| 21% standard | The default rate for supplies of goods and services in Romania |
| 11% reduced | A defined list including certain food products, medicines, water supply, accommodation and other categories set out in the Fiscal Code |
| 0% with right of deduction | Intra-Community supplies and exports, subject to holding the documentary proof |
Both the 21% and the 11% rates have applied since 1 August 2025, under Law 141/2025, published in the Official Gazette no. 699 of 25 July 2025, replacing the previous 19% and 9%. Two practical consequences follow. First, any English-language source still quoting 19% is out of date, and pricing built on it is wrong. Second, ERP tax codes, marketplace settings and SAF-T nomenclature mappings all had to be updated in mid-2025; systems updated only in part now issue a mixture of correct and incorrect invoices, which is the harder problem to detect. The reduced-rate list is not a stable category and should be checked against the Fiscal Code for the specific product, rather than assumed by analogy with another member state.
What registering late actually costs
A Dutch company moves its own stock into a Romanian fulfilment centre in February 2026 and begins selling locally. It registers only in November, after ANAF raises the question. Between February and October it invoiced RON 1,200,000 of local sales without Romanian VAT.
The VAT is due from the date the obligation arose, and the customers are gone. Two arithmetics apply, and neither is comfortable:
- if the amounts already invoiced are treated as VAT-inclusive, which is the usual outcome once the invoices can no longer be corrected, the output VAT is 1,200,000 × 21 / 121 = RON 208,264;
- if the VAT is assessed on top of the invoiced price, it is 1,200,000 × 21% = RON 252,000.
Either figure comes out of the seller’s own margin rather than from the customer, and late-payment interest and penalties run per day from each original due date, with the failure to register sanctioned separately. Registration before the first pallet arrives costs a fraction of that, which is the whole argument for settling the question while the goods are still in transit.
The filing set that follows a Romanian VAT number
The VAT number arrives with a reporting calendar attached. Its core is not phased in and does not wait for the first sale.
| Filing | What it covers | Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| VAT return D300 | Output and input VAT for the period | 25th of the month following the period |
| EC Sales List D390 | Intra-Community supplies, acquisitions and certain services | 25th of the month following |
| Domestic transactions report D394 | Supplies and purchases in Romania with Romanian VAT-registered persons; due only where such transactions exist | 30th of the month following, 28 or 29 February for January |
| SAF-T D406 | Simplified file for non-residents, since 1 January 2025 | Last calendar day of the month following the period |
| Intrastat | Physical movements of goods, above one million lei per flow | 15th of the month following, filed with the statistics institute |
| RO e-Factura | Issuing with a fixed establishment; without one, B2B invoices reported in parallel with ordinary invoicing, no B2C obligation; receiving always | 5 working days for those obliged to issue |
The VAT period — monthly or quarterly — is allocated at registration and can change during the life of the registration, most often when an intra-Community acquisition forces a move from quarterly to monthly. The full map of recurring dates, including the annual filings, is in the Romanian tax calendar.
Two filings surprise foreign groups most often. D394 has no direct equivalent in most member states: it reports domestic transactions in detail, and ANAF reconciles your report against your Romanian counterparty’s report automatically. For a non-established company it is due only where it transacts in Romania with persons registered for Romanian VAT. SAF-T applies to non-residents in a simplified form covering the operations carried out under the Romanian VAT number, and the obligation exists for every period, including periods with no transactions.
e-Factura: issuing with a fixed establishment, B2B reporting without one
This is the single most misreported point about Romania in English-language sources, so it is worth stating plainly.
The obligation to issue invoices through RO e-Factura falls on taxable persons established in Romania — Romanian companies and fixed establishments of foreign companies. A company that holds only a Romanian VAT number, with no fixed establishment, does not issue through the system. It issues invoices under its ordinary rules, with the Romanian VAT correctly applied, and that invoice is the document its customer receives.
It does, however, have a reporting obligation: for B2B transactions only, it transmits its invoices to RO e-Factura for reporting purposes, in parallel with its ordinary invoicing. Its B2C invoices — the flow that entered the system for established taxpayers on 1 January 2025, under GEO 138/2024 — are outside that obligation. It also needs the system on the inbound side, because Romanian suppliers transmit their invoices to it there — the source of the input VAT claimed in the VAT return. Companies that never set up access spend the following year reconstructing purchase invoices from supplier emails.
Where a fixed establishment does exist, the position is different: all invoices, B2C included, must be issued through the system, in the required XML structure, within 5 working days of issue or of the legal invoicing deadline — a term set by GEO 89/2025 from 1 January 2026, replacing the five calendar days that applied before.
VAT refunds and recovering Romanian input VAT
There are two distinct routes, and using the wrong one costs a full refund cycle.
If you are registered for Romanian VAT, input VAT is recovered through the D300 return. A credit position can be carried forward against future output VAT or requested as a refund by ticking the refund option on the return. Refund requests above the routine thresholds trigger a documentary check or, for larger or higher-risk claims, an anticipated tax inspection. In practice the file wins or loses on documentation: valid invoices, proof of transport for zero-rated supplies, and consistency between the D300, the D394 and the SAF-T file for the same period.
If you are not registered and carry out no taxable operations in Romania — the classic case of a foreign company incurring Romanian hotel, fuel, exhibition or supplier costs — recovery goes through the refund procedure for businesses established in another member state, filed electronically through the portal of your own tax administration under the framework explained by the European Commission, or through the equivalent procedure for businesses established outside the EU, which is conditional on reciprocity. The two routes are mutually exclusive for the same period: input VAT relating to a period in which you were registered belongs in the return, not in a refund claim.
Specific situations
Marketplace sellers with Romanian stock. Registration follows the stock, and the filings follow the registration. Sales data arrives aggregated from the platform, while D394 and SAF-T need document-level detail, so agreeing the export granularity with the platform is the first technical step.
Groups with a shared service centre. The accounting is clean but the chart of accounts is a group chart, and Romanian nomenclatures have to be mapped onto it once, then maintained. A group-level restructuring that renumbers accounts silently breaks the Romanian SAF-T file two months later.
Construction and installation projects. These often create both a fixed establishment for VAT and a permanent establishment for corporate tax, on different tests and different timelines. They are worth analysing before mobilisation, while the contract can still be structured, rather than afterwards.
Companies that stop trading in Romania. Deregistration is an active step. Leaving a dormant VAT number in place keeps every filing obligation alive, including nil D300 and nil SAF-T, and late-filing fines accumulate against a company that believes it has left the country.
The errors we see most often
- Waiting for a threshold. There is no registration threshold for a non-established company.
- Registering after the stock arrives. The warehouse contract is the trigger, and goods are usually already in transit when the question first gets asked.
- Applying 19% VAT. The standard rate has been 21% since 1 August 2025, and the reduced rate 11%.
- Assuming the one-stop shop covers everything. It covers distance sales; it does not cover a local sale made from Romanian stock.
- Treating the VAT number as the finish line. D300 and SAF-T start immediately; D390, D394 and Intrastat follow as soon as the flows that trigger them exist.
- Skipping nil filings. The obligation exists for periods with no transactions, and a missing nil return is a fine like any other.
- Overlooking e-Factura reporting. Without a fixed establishment you do not issue through the system, but your B2B invoices still have to be reported there.
- Non-EU companies attempting direct registration without a fiscal representative, and having the file rejected after weeks of translation work.
How we help
We take the whole cycle: the analysis of whether registration is required and whether a fixed establishment exists, the preparation and filing of form 015, fiscal representation where the company is established outside the EU, and then the recurring filings — D300, D390, D394, SAF-T and Intrastat — produced from your own ERP export or from Excel with our mapping and validation tools, and filed through the Virtual Private Space with our digital certificate, with the ANAF receipt sent to you for each return. Start with VAT registration for non-residents, or tell us what you are selling and where the goods sit.
