On 18 February 2020, the European Council adopted a legislative package to request payment service providers (PSPs) to transmit information on cross-border payments originating from Member States and on the beneficiary (“the payee”) of these cross-border payments. Under this package, payment service providers offering payment services in the EU will have to monitor the payees of cross-border payments and transmit information on those who receive more than 25 cross-border payments per quarter to the administrations of the Member States

This information will then be centralised in a European database, the Central Electronic System of Payment information (CESOP) where it will be stored, aggregated and cross-checked with other European databases. All information in CESOP will then be made available to anti-fraud experts of Member States via a network called Eurofisc.

The objective of this new measure is to give tax authorities of the Member States the right instruments to detect possible e-commerce VAT fraud carried out by sellers established in another Member State or in a non-EU country.

The measure respects the data protection rules. Only information related to payments that are likely to be connected to an economic activity is transmitted to the tax authorities. Information on consumers and on the reason underlying the payment is not part of the transmission.

The new rules will apply as of 1 January 2024 and the first payment data submission by PSPs to the competent national authority (IAPR) concerning the a’ quarter of 2024 will be made by 30 April 2024.