Kapatens organizes a group claim against the Swedish state, seeking recovery for wrongfully charged VAT on postal services levied on Swedish companies and organizations in violation of EU law.

Under the VAT Directive, all Member States shall ensure that universal postal services are exempt from VAT. In 2006, the European Commission notified Sweden that it was in breach of the EU Treaty and the VAT Directive by charging VAT on such postal services. Although the state was informed by the European Commission that it was not entitled to charge such VAT, the state did not make any changes to the Swedish tax legislation in this regard and buyers of Swedish postal services were thus still forced to pay VAT for services which are to be exempt from VAT. A 2015 judgment by the European Court of Justice established that Sweden acted in violation of EU law. Thereafter, Sweden did change the tax legislation so that some, but not all, postal services were exempt from VAT. Several experts consider the legislative changes to be insufficient.

The judgment of the European Court of Justice thus made it clear that, since the entry into the EU, Sweden had charged VAT on postal services in violation of EU law. This means, in our opinion, that all companies and organizations that do not have the right, or only partial right, to deduct VAT and which have purchased such postal services are entitled to a refund or reimbursement for the loss caused to them as a result of the breach of the Treaty.

Kapatens now offers to acquire the affected organizations’ claims in order to itself demand payment from the state and take legal action before Swedish courts.

Please find more information here