Deregistering from VAT

When a VAT registration ends during the month, the return opens with a Deregistration card. On deregistering, VAT is paid on the goods still held whose input VAT was deducted, at their acquisition cost (or cost price, if there's none), and the input VAT deducted on fixed assets still held is corrected (VAT Act § 29(10), § 32(4)), both in the month of deregistration. Arvello tracks neither, so the card asks:

• Stock you still hold — goods other than fixed assets whose input VAT you deducted: stock for resale or production, and also materials and equipment you expensed. Enter the acquisition cost of those taxed at the standard rate, which goes on line 1, and of those taxed at 9%, which goes on line 2. What the goods cost, not what they're worth now or would sell for.
• Fixed assets you still hold — every asset in your fixed asset register still held on the last day of the registration. For each one whose VAT you deducted, enter the VAT deducted. Tick Property for a building, land or another part of immovable property. The correction period is 5 calendar years, or 10 for immovable property and what was bought for it (VAT Act § 32(4¹)), the first being the year the asset went into use, and Arvello repays the share for the years left, the year of deregistration included, as the input VAT regulation does when an asset is sold during that period. A laptop in use from March 2025 with €240 of VAT deducted, deregistered in October 2026, has 4 of 5 years left: €192 goes on line 10. For an asset already in use when the registration began, enter what you deducted on registering (VAT Act § 29(5²)): that deduction covered only the years then left, so Arvello repays its share of those. Each row shows its figure before you save.

The figures describe what you hold on the registration's last day, so the card takes them, and the return can be approved, once that day has come.

Save and recalculate stores the figures and recalculates the return. It also books the VAT the figures add, which no invoice posts: Dr 5100 Operating expenses, Cr 2100 VAT payable, dated the registration's last day. Changing the figures later books only the difference, and moving the registration's end date within the month moves the booking to the new day. If the registration's end date moves, even within the month, or the fixed asset register changes after you've saved (an asset added or backdated, a disposal moved before the last day, or an asset's in-service date corrected), the checklist asks you to check the figures and save them again. Saving with every field empty confirms you hold no such stock or assets. Until you've saved, the checklist shows an error and the return can't be approved; if you can't work the figures out here, file this return in e-MTA with the adjustment instead. Once the return is approved the figures are frozen with it: reopen it to change them, or, once it's filed, start an amendment. If you record the registration's end after the month's return was approved, Arvello won't export or send that return until you reopen it and enter the figures.

Line 10 also shows on the VAT Summary tab, under Corrections.

If two registrations end in the same month (deregistered, registered again and deregistered again), Arvello can't record both sets of figures: the checklist says so, and that return is filed in e-MTA. The same goes for a registration that ended between August 2022 and the end of 2024, when press publications were taxed at 5%: the card takes stock at the standard rate and at 9% only.

Advances received before deregistering

The same return's checklist warns about advances received while the company was registered, for a supply after the registration ended: one item per receipt, with its date. An advance is taxed in the month it arrived (VAT Act § 11(1) point 2), so issue a VAT invoice for it dated in that month, which that month's return then includes, and credit the amount off the later invoice. If that month's return has already been filed, correct it in e-MTA. An advance refunded before the supply needs no VAT invoice (§ 29(9)).