If you are a UK freelancer selling services to clients in the EU, the invoice question that comes up first is a simple one: do I add UK VAT, charge 0%, or leave VAT off entirely? The answer depends on who your customer is — a business or a private individual — and on what kind of service you are selling. Getting it wrong either overcharges your client or leaves you explaining the difference to HMRC later.
Business customers: usually no UK VAT, thanks to the reverse charge
When your EU customer is a VAT-registered business, the supply is generally outside the scope of UK VAT. You do not add UK VAT to the invoice. Instead, the customer accounts for the VAT themselves in their own country under the reverse charge — that is the point of the mechanism. Your invoice should state clearly that the reverse charge applies, so the customer's accountant can see at a glance why no VAT was charged.
Two habits make this clean. First, get and keep your customer's VAT number, and check it is valid before you invoice. Second, keep the evidence that the customer is a business: the contract, the VAT number, and the correspondence showing the work was for their business. If HMRC ever asks why no VAT was charged, that paper trail is your answer.
Private individuals: usually UK VAT applies
The picture flips when your customer is a private individual in the EU. For most services supplied to a consumer, the place of supply is where you, the supplier, belong — the UK. That means UK VAT normally applies at the usual rate, just as it would for a UK customer. There are exceptions for certain services — land-related services, passenger transport and a few others are treated differently — but for the typical freelance service, a design, a consultation, a piece of writing, UK VAT goes on the invoice.
One area where freelancers often trip up is digital services: software, online courses, downloads. Since Brexit, UK businesses no longer use the EU's VAT MOSS system. For electronically supplied services to EU consumers, the UK rules now apply, so UK VAT is generally charged. Do not carry over pre-2021 habits here — the system changed, and the old MOSS registration does not cover you anymore.
Goods are a different question
This article is about services. If you are also shipping physical goods to the EU, the rules are different again: exports of goods can be zero-rated when the conditions are met, and the customer may face import VAT and duties on their side. Keep the two apart in your records. A mixed invoice — design work plus printed materials shipped to Berlin — needs the service and the goods treated separately.
The invoicing checklist
Before you send an invoice to an EU customer, run through this: is the customer a business or a consumer? If a business, do you have their VAT number on file and does the invoice say reverse charge? If a consumer, have you charged UK VAT at the right rate? And is the place-of-supply treatment written down somewhere you can find it again? Five minutes of checks now saves a correction and an awkward conversation with a client later.
For the background on how supplies fall into zero-rated, exempt and outside-scope categories — which is exactly the distinction your EU invoices turn on — see this guide to VAT on services sold to EU customers.
General information only, not tax advice. VAT rules change and edge cases are common — check HMRC guidance or ask an accountant for your specific situation.
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