The Portuguese government may shortly agree to re-classify restaurant food and services from the standard Portuguese VAT rate of 23% to the reduced rate of 13%. This follows news last week that Greece is lowering restaurant VAT rate from 1 August 2013.
The push to cut the restaurant Portugal VAT rate is being led by the opposition political parties which have made it a condition of supporting further governmental austerity measures. It believes the reduction could help create over 30,000 jobs in the crucial tourism industry. The cost of the proposed reduction would be €280m.
In Greece, the VAT reduction had to be approved by the bailout Troika, the IMF and IMF.
VP Global Indirect Tax
Richard Asquith
Richard Asquith is VP Global Indirect Tax at Avalara, helping businesses understand their compliance obligations as they grow globally. He is part of the European leadership team which this year won International Tax Review's Tax Technology Firm of the Year. Richard qualified as an accountant with KPMG in the UK, and went on to work in Hungary, Russia and France with EY.