VAT Recovery on Business Travel to Austria

If your company sends people to Austria, you have paid Austrian VAT on most of what they spent, and a large share of it is recoverable. Austria refunds VAT to businesses from anywhere in the world, with no reciprocity test and no local representative required, yet most foreign companies never claim it.

Austria is in the European Union, so its refund system runs along the standard EU lines: two routes that lead to the same outcome, one for businesses established inside the EU and one for businesses established outside it. The tax itself is administered by the Austrian Ministry of Finance through the tax office, Finanzamt Österreich.

The route you use depends on where your business is established, not on where you travelled from. The eligibility rules and the list of recoverable costs are the same either way. This page explains who qualifies, what you can claim, what Austria blocks, and exactly how each route works. To see how Austria fits alongside the other countries we cover, start with our VAT recovery service.

Not Every Austrian Invoice Carries 20% VAT

Austria charges VAT, known locally as Umsatzsteuer or USt, at a standard rate of 20%, administered by Finanzamt Österreich. The standard rate applies to most business costs, including conference and seminar fees, venue and meeting room hire, equipment and AV rental, professional services, and telecommunications. Before assembling a claim, though, it helps to know which travel costs carry a lower rate, because Austria’s reduced rates are easy to get wrong.

Hotels and restaurant meals are taxed at 10%, not 20%. This is the rate that surprises foreign finance teams, and it carries a trap of its own. Austria applies a reduced 10% rate to hotel accommodation, restaurant and catering services, most food, passenger transport, and books. Hotel accommodation moved from 13% back to 10% on 1 November 2018 and has stayed there, so any source or template still using 13% for Austrian hotels is out of date. For a business traveller, the VAT on a Vienna hotel bill is 10%, and the recoverable figure per night is correspondingly lower than in a country that applies its full standard rate to lodging.

A few travel-adjacent items sit at 13%. Austria’s second reduced rate of 13% applies to things like admission to cultural and sporting events, domestic air travel, and amusement parks. These are less common on a business trip than hotels and meals, but where they appear, the recoverable rate is 13%, not 10% or 20%.

Many B2B services to a foreign business carry no Austrian VAT. Where an Austrian supplier provides a service to a business established outside Austria, the place-of-supply rules often treat the supply as taking place where the customer belongs, so no Austrian VAT should appear on the invoice. Common examples include consultancy, legal, accounting, and advertising services. If you have been charged Austrian VAT on a service that should have been outside the scope, the right fix is to ask the supplier to correct the invoice and refund the VAT, not to reclaim it from the tax office.

Where Austrian VAT genuinely applies, and where the recovery opportunity sits, is on goods and services consumed in Austria: hotels, conference and venue costs, restaurant meals within the limits below, local transport, and equipment hire.

Who Can Claim an Austrian VAT Refund?

Your business can claim a refund of Austrian VAT if it meets all of the following:

• Established outside Austria: Your company has no fixed establishment, seat, or branch in Austria.
• Not registered, or required to be registered, for Austrian VAT: You do not file Austrian VAT returns and have no obligation to.
• Not making taxable supplies in Austria: You are not selling goods or services in Austria that would trigger a registration obligation. If you are, you recover through registration instead, not through the refund scheme.
• Incurred Austrian VAT on business costs: You paid VAT on goods or services bought in Austria for genuine business purposes, on invoices addressed to your company.

Two Routes, One Outcome

If your business is established outside the EU (for example in Colombia, the United States, the United Kingdom, or Switzerland), you claim under the 13th VAT Directive. You apply on paper directly to Finanzamt Österreich. The deadline is 30 June of the year after the calendar year in which the VAT was incurred, and it cannot be extended.

If your business is established in the EU (but not in Austria), you claim under the EU refund procedure, Directive 2008/9/EC, often called the 8th Directive route. You do not contact the Austrian tax office directly. Instead you file electronically through the tax portal in your own home country, on what Austria processes as the U5 application, and your home authority forwards it to Austria. The deadline is 30 September of the following year.

The eligibility rules and the recoverable costs are the same under both routes. Only the procedure, the deadline, and one detail on fuel differ. The rest of this page focuses mainly on the non-EU route, since that is the path for Colombian-registered companies and most of our clients, but EU-established businesses recover the same expenses.

No Reciprocity, No Representative

Two points make Austria more open than its paperwork suggests. Austria has no reciprocity agreements, and it confirms that it refunds VAT even so, to businesses from any country, whether or not the home country operates a matching VAT or refund arrangement. And Austria does not require a foreign business to appoint a tax representative in order to claim a refund. You can file directly or authorise a tax agent by choice.

One practical caveat worth knowing: the Austrian tax authorities do not send official correspondence, such as assessments, to addresses outside Austria. Many foreign claimants therefore appoint an Austrian agent or mailing contact to receive and act on correspondence, not because the law compels it, but because it keeps the claim moving. We manage this for clients as part of the service.

For companies registered in Colombia: there is no reciprocity barrier, and Colombian entities recover Austrian VAT on the same terms as anyone else. This is relevant for Colombian offices of Austrian groups, for example in engineering, mechanical and plant manufacturing, and cable-car and ropeway technology, whose staff travel to Austria for headquarters meetings, training, and trade fairs.

What Expenses Qualify for Recovery

The governing principle is that a foreign business can recover VAT that an Austrian VAT-registered business would have been able to deduct as input tax. In practice, the common recoverable categories for business travel are:

• Hotel accommodation (10%): The full 10% on the room and standard ancillary charges, including breakfast where it is included in the room price. Across a team and several nights, usually one of the larger recoverable items.
• Restaurant and catering (10%): Recoverable where the cost is a genuine business expense, subject to the entertainment limit below.
• Conference and seminar fees (20%): Registration, delegate passes, and session fees.
• Trade fair and exhibition costs (20%): Stand rental, build costs, and registration.
• Venue and meeting room hire (20%): Rooms booked for meetings, workshops, or events.
• Equipment and AV rental (20%): Presentation kit, staging, and technical hire.
• Local passenger transport (10%): Trains, buses, and taxis, where VAT is shown on the receipt.
• Telecommunications and data (20%): Austrian connectivity charges.
• Goods purchased for export (20%): Items bought in Austria and taken out for business use, with proof of export.

What’s Restricted or Blocked

Austria allows broad recovery, but it blocks several categories outright, following the deduction limits in the Austrian Turnover Tax Act (UStG 1994).

Entertainment is blocked. VAT on entertainment expenses, such as hospitality and client functions, is not recoverable. Ordinary business meals during a trip are treated differently from entertainment, but the line matters, so it is worth getting advice on which of your meal costs qualify.

Passenger vehicles are blocked. VAT on the purchase, hire, or running of passenger cars, combined passenger and goods vehicles, and motorcycles is not recoverable. This is a broad block and catches most road-vehicle costs.

Certain travel-related inputs are restricted. Austrian law restricts deduction on some travel-related inputs under the UStG. We check each item against the current rules rather than assuming.

Fuel, under the non-EU route only. This is an Austria-specific quirk that catches non-EU claimants. VAT on fuel is refundable to EU-established businesses under the 2008/9 route, but it is excluded under the 13th Directive route used by non-EU businesses. So a Colombian or other non-EU company cannot recover Austrian fuel VAT, while an EU company can. Plan the claim accordingly.

Invoices not in the company name are not refunded. The invoice must be addressed to the claiming business. VAT on an invoice issued to an employee, or to a different group company, is not recoverable.

Private and non-business costs are not refunded. Anything for private benefit, or unrelated to the business, is excluded.

How Much Can You Recover? A Worked Example

Consider a Colombian subsidiary of an Austrian group sending a team of four to Vienna for four nights: an industry conference, a set of headquarters meetings, and a workshop.

That is roughly €1,380 from a single trip. A company sending teams to Austria several times a year accumulates a meaningful annual figure. The example is deliberately conservative: it excludes client entertainment, which Austria blocks, and applies the correct 10% rate to hotels, meals, and transport rather than overstating them at 20%.

Deadlines and Claim Periods

Austria enforces its deadlines strictly. The 13th Directive deadline in particular cannot be extended, and a late application is lost.

Non-EU businesses (13th Directive): The application must be posted to Finanzamt Österreich no later than 30 June of the year after the calendar year in which the VAT was incurred. For VAT incurred in 2026, the deadline is 30 June 2027.

EU businesses (2008/9 route): The electronic application is due by 30 September of the following year, filed through your home country portal.

The non-EU deadline is three months earlier than the EU one. Teams used to a 30 September cycle elsewhere are the ones most likely to miss it.

Claim periods and minimum amounts:

• The refund period must cover at least three consecutive calendar months within one calendar year, up to a maximum of one calendar year. A period at the end of the year may be shorter, for example November and December, or just December. Only whole calendar months count.
• Minimum €400: for a refund period of less than a calendar year.
• Minimum €50: for a refund period that is the full calendar year, or the year-end remainder.

Required Documentation

Incomplete documentation is the leading cause of delayed or rejected claims. For the non-EU route, Finanzamt Österreich expects:

• The 13th Directive refund application, completed in German or English. The person claiming, or their tax adviser, signs it.
• A certificate of taxable status, form U70 (Unternehmerbestätigung), issued by your home tax authority, confirming you carry on business there. For Colombian companies, a current DIAN registration document, such as a RUT-based certification, supports this.
• Original invoices, or for electronic invoices a printout, together with a summary list or breakdown. Each invoice must be addressed to the claiming business and show the VAT separately. For invoices over €1,000, or fuel receipts over €250 on the EU route, a copy may be specifically required.
• A power of attorney if a tax agent files on your behalf.

A credit card slip is not a VAT invoice. Ask hotels and conference organisers for a proper VAT invoice in the company name at the time of booking.

EU-route claimants do not send paper invoices by default; the electronic U5 application captures the invoice data, and Austria may then request copies for higher-value invoices as noted above.

How to Submit Your Claim

Non-EU businesses post the completed 13th Directive application, with the U70 certificate and original invoices, to the Austrian tax office that handles foreign-business refunds, Finanzamt Österreich. Confirm the current postal address on the application form or the Austrian Business Service Portal (USP) before sending, as office routing can change.

EU businesses do not contact the Austrian tax office directly. You file the U5 application electronically through the VAT refund portal operated by your own national tax authority, which validates and forwards it to Austria.

Using an agent or representative. You can authorise a specialist to prepare and file the claim, deal with the tax office, receive correspondence in Austria, and handle the refund on your behalf. This is the usual approach for companies without in-house Austrian VAT expertise, and it is also how foreign claimants solve the no-correspondence-abroad issue noted earlier.

Processing Times and Payment

Austria works to a six-month processing time for refund claims, measured from receipt of a complete application. If the tax office refuses a claim in whole or in part, you can appeal; Austria has confirmed a maximum six-month duration for the refund appeals process and does not require a pre-defined format for the appeal.

Refunds are paid by bank transfer. Make sure the bank details on the application are correct, including for an account outside Austria. Most refusals trace back to documentation problems, a missing or expired U70 certificate, invoices not in the company name, or items that are blocked, rather than to fundamental eligibility. Most are avoidable with a proper review before filing.

Common Mistakes That Cost Businesses Money

1. Missing the 30 June deadline. The non-EU deadline is earlier than the EU’s 30 September and cannot be extended. Diarise it well ahead.
2. Using the wrong route. EU-established businesses file electronically through their home portal; non-EU businesses file on paper to Finanzamt Österreich. Filing through the wrong channel wastes the deadline.
3. Budgeting hotels and meals at 20%, or using an old 13% hotel rate. Austrian hotels, restaurant meals, and local transport are taxed at 10%. Overstating the rate inflates the expected refund; using the pre-2018 13% hotel rate is simply wrong.
4. Non-EU claimants expecting to recover fuel VAT. Fuel is recoverable on the EU route but blocked on the 13th Directive route. A non-EU company should not count on it.
5. Claiming entertainment. Austria blocks entertainment VAT. Strip client hospitality out of the claim.
6. Invoices in the employee’s name. The tax office does not refund VAT on invoices addressed to anyone other than the claiming company. Ask for invoices in the company name at the point of sale.
7. Not claiming at all. The most common and most expensive mistake. For any company with regular Austrian travel spend, the recoverable VAT is worth pursuing.

Why Austrian Multinationals’ Overseas Teams Often Miss This

Many overseas subsidiaries of Austrian groups send staff to Austria regularly for headquarters reviews, training, and trade fairs. Those trips generate recoverable VAT, especially on hotels and event fees. Yet the refund often goes unclaimed, for predictable reasons.

Local finance focuses on local tax. A subsidiary’s finance team is occupied with its own country’s obligations. Austrian VAT recovery sits outside that frame and never reaches the to-do list.

Each side assumes the other handles it. The Austrian head office may not realise a foreign subsidiary’s staff incurred recoverable VAT, while the subsidiary assumes head office deals with Austrian tax. The result is that nobody files.

Expense systems do not flag it. Platforms such as SAP Concur and Oracle categorise and approve expenses well, but they do not surface foreign VAT recovery opportunities. The data is already captured; it just needs to be extracted and submitted through the right channel.

Start Your Austrian VAT Claim

We handle the Austrian refund from start to finish so your team does not have to learn the tax office’s process, track the 30 June deadline, or complete the 13th Directive application. We work directly from the expense data you already hold.

How it works:

1. Send us your invoices: share your Austrian business travel invoices from the current or previous year. We accept exports from SAP Concur, Oracle, and any major expense system, or simple scans.
2. We tell you what’s recoverable: we review every invoice, confirm the correct rate, flag anything blocked, and give you a clear figure. This review is free and carries no obligation.
3. We file and follow up: we prepare the application, manage the U70 certificate and documentation, handle Austrian correspondence, submit to Finanzamt Österreich, and chase it through to payment in your nominated account.

You pay only when the refund comes through. No recovery, no fee.

Talk to us:

• Contact form: coromandel.co/en/contact-us
• Colombia: +57 320 492 5300 (Bogotá)
• United States: +1 770 783 6966 (Atlanta, Georgia)

Get a free review of your Austrian VAT →

Frequently Asked Questions

References

1. European Commission, Taxation and Customs Union, Austria 13th Directive (86/560/EEC) VAT refunds: https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2021-02/at_en.pdf
2. Austrian Business Service Portal (USP), Vorsteuererstattungsverfahren (input VAT refund procedure): https://www.usp.gv.at/steuern-finanzen/umsatzsteuer/umsaetze-mit-auslandsbezug/vorsteuererstattungsverfahren.html
3. Austrian Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF), Bundesministerium für Finanzen: https://www.bmf.gv.at/
4. PwC, Worldwide Tax Summaries, Austria, Other taxes (VAT rates): https://taxsummaries.pwc.com/austria/corporate/other-taxes