Buying from Spain into Italy: intra-community acquisition VAT and reverse charge, step by step

When goods travel from Spain to Italy by road, it is tempting to call it an import and to expect customs, duty and import VAT at a border. None of that applies. Spain and Italy are both EU member states, so the goods are already in free circulation and stay that way for the whole journey — including the transit leg through France. There is no export declaration in Spain, no import entry in Italy, no T1 or NCTS transit movement, no duty and no import VAT collected at any frontier. There is also no EORI requirement for the move itself, because EORI is a customs identifier for trade with countries outside the EU.

What replaces the customs machinery is a pair of VAT obligations that the two traders handle on their own VAT returns. On the Spanish side the supplier makes an intra-community supply (an entrega intracomunitaria) and zero-rates it. On the Italian side the buyer makes an intra-community acquisition (an acquisto intracomunitario) and self-accounts for the VAT through the reverse charge. No money for VAT changes hands across the border; the tax is declared, not paid at a barrier.

The practical upshot for an Italian buyer is that the paperwork that actually travels with the truck is short — a commercial invoice, the CMR consignment note and a packing list — and the VAT work happens afterwards, in your accounting system and on your periodic returns. The corridor itself is covered in our Spain → Italy corridor guide; this guide is purely about the VAT mechanism.

The single precondition that makes the whole zero-rated mechanism work is your VAT number. As the Italian buyer you must hold a partita IVA that is enabled for intra-EU operations and therefore listed as valid in VIES — the EU's VAT Information Exchange System, the public database suppliers use to check a counterparty's VAT number before zero-rating a cross-border supply.

An Italian partita IVA is not automatically active for intra-EU transactions. A business has to be included in the VIES register (the inclusion is requested through the Agenzia delle Entrate), and until that inclusion is in place your number will return as not valid for intra-EU purposes when the Spanish supplier checks it. If that happens, the supplier is right to refuse to zero-rate the sale and will instead charge Spanish VAT — which is the most common and most avoidable cause of an unexpected tax cost on this lane.

So the first step, well before the goods are dispatched, is to confirm that your partita IVA is VIES-enabled and to give the supplier the full number in the correct IT format. Equally, check that the supplier's Spanish NIF-IVA is itself VIES-valid, since both numbers belong on the invoice. It costs nothing to verify a number in VIES and it removes the most expensive surprise on the whole transaction.

From the supplier's point of view, an intra-community supply to a VAT-registered business in another member state is exempt with credit — zero-rated — provided two conditions are met. First, the customer must have a valid VAT number in another member state, verified in VIES; that is your VIES-enabled partita IVA. Second, the supplier must hold proof that the goods physically left Spain and arrived in another member state — the transport evidence. The CMR consignment note, signed on delivery, is the standard piece of that proof.

When both conditions hold, the supplier issues the invoice at 0% Spanish VAT, marks it as an intra-community supply, and reports the transaction on the recapitulative statement, the Spanish modelo 349 (the periodic listing of intra-EU supplies and acquisitions). The modelo 349 is the Spanish trader's own filing obligation; it is not something a carrier files or touches.

If either condition fails — your VAT number is not VIES-valid, or the supplier cannot evidence dispatch — the supplier cannot safely zero-rate and will charge Spanish VAT to protect itself in a future audit. That Spanish VAT is then difficult and slow for an Italian buyer to recover. Getting the VIES status and the transport evidence right up front is what keeps the supply correctly zero-rated.

Take a concrete case. Your Spanish supplier sells you goods for €20,000 and, because you have given a valid VIES-enabled partita IVA and the goods are dispatched to Italy with CMR proof, invoices them at 0% Spanish VAT. The invoice total you pay the supplier is €20,000 — no VAT line.

On the Italian side you integrate that invoice. Applying the standard 22% rate, you self-charge €4,400 of Italian IVA (22% of €20,000). You record €4,400 as output VAT in the sales register and the same €4,400 as input VAT in the purchases register. Assuming you are fully taxable and can deduct input VAT in full, the €4,400 you owe and the €4,400 you reclaim offset exactly: the net VAT effect of the purchase is zero, and no VAT cash leaves your business for this transaction.

The figure changes only if your right to deduct is restricted. A business that cannot fully recover input VAT — for example one with partly exempt activities subject to a pro-rata, or a purchase of a category with a deduction limit — will deduct less than the €4,400 it self-charges, and the difference becomes a real cost. The 22% used here is the standard Italian rate for illustration; the rate that actually applies depends on what the goods are, and the deductibility depends on your VAT position. This is an indicative example, not a ruling for your specific case — confirm the rate and your recovery position with your adviser.

Because there is no customs file on an intra-EU move, the documents the driver actually carries are few — but they have to be right, because they are what the supplier relies on to zero-rate and what Italian goods-in teams reconcile against the physical load. Three documents do the work.

The commercial invoice is the centre of the set. For an intra-community supply it should show both VAT numbers — the Spanish supplier's NIF-IVA and your IT partita IVA — and carry wording that identifies the transaction as a zero-rated intra-community supply subject to reverse charge in the country of destination. That reverse-charge reference is what signals to everyone in the chain, including your own accountant, that the VAT is to be self-accounted in Italy rather than charged in Spain.

The CMR consignment note (the lettera di vettura CMR) is the international road-freight transport document, signed by the consignee on delivery. Beyond being the carriage contract, it is the supplier's primary evidence that the goods left Spain and reached Italy — the transport proof the zero-rating depends on. The packing list, one line per pallet or carton with net and gross weights, lets the Italian goods-in team book the load in and should match the invoice and the CMR on pallet count, weight and value. Reconcile all three before the truck leaves Spain; discrepancies trigger holds at goods-in even though there is no customs involved.

SAVA's role on this transaction is the physical move. We are the carrier on the Spain → Italy lane, running a scheduled groupage service with Monday, Wednesday and Friday departures from our Castellar del Vallès hub near Barcelona, on full truckload and LTL groupage across owned and partner carriers. We issue the CMR consignment note — which doubles as the supplier's transport evidence for zero-rating — and deliver against it, with the consignee's signature closing the loop.

What we do not do is the tax. We do not handle Italian VAT, we do not prepare or transmit the SdI integration (TD18), we do not file INTRASTAT, and we do not file the Spanish modelo 349. The reverse-charge accounting, the VAT-ledger entries, the VIES enablement and the statistical returns are the traders' own responsibilities, handled with your accountant or commercialista. As the CMR carrier we hold the statutory CMR liability — 8.33 SDR per kilogram of gross weight affected, an indicative €10–11 per kg at current SDR rates — which is below replacement value for high-value cargo; if your goods are worth more than that, ask us to arrange additional all-risks cargo insurance or source your own. We do not insure cargo beyond the CMR limit by default.

None of the above is tax or legal advice. It is general information about how the intra-community acquisition mechanism works on the Spain → Italy lane, and the rates, thresholds and procedures change. Confirm your specific position with a qualified Italian tax adviser before relying on it.

Partita IVA confirmed VIES-enabled — your IT VAT number is active for intra-EU operations and verified in VIES, and the supplier's Spanish NIF-IVA is VIES-valid too. This is the precondition for the zero-rated supply; without it the supplier charges Spanish VAT.

Invoice carries both VAT numbers and the reverse-charge wording — the Spanish NIF-IVA, your IT partita IVA, 0% Spanish VAT, and a note identifying the supply as intra-community and subject to reverse charge in Italy.

Reverse-charge process lined up with your accountant — integrate the invoice with Italian IVA, register it in both the sales (vendite) and purchases (acquisti) ledgers so output and input VAT net to zero for a fully-taxable business, and transmit the SdI integration as document type TD18.

INTRASTAT checked — confirm whether your intra-EU purchases have crossed the arrivals reporting threshold and, if so, that the declaration is being filed.

Documents reconciled — commercial invoice, CMR and packing list agree on pallet count, weight and value before the truck leaves Spain, and the signed CMR returns to the supplier as transport proof.

Cover for high-value cargo confirmed — if the goods are worth more than the CMR limit covers, arrange additional all-risks cargo insurance rather than relying on the statutory CMR liability.

Quote in hand — for the carriage itself, the loading meters, pricing and a written quote on the Spain → Italy lane are available in around 15–20 minutes and hold for 24 hours. The VAT, as above, sits with you and your adviser, not with the carrier.