Digital Services Tax Proposed

In early April 2019, the Austrian Federal Government published a draft of the Digital Tax Act 2020 which is currently under review. The main goal of the new law is to achieve "fair taxation" by taxing online advertising services that are provided by large groups of companies in Austria.

Why is a Digital Services Tax necessary in Austria?

Currently, only conventional advertising (e.g. in print media, radio or television) is subject to an advertising tax in Austria pursuant to the Advertising Tax Act. In order to consider technological developments and the ongoing digitalisation process, the Digital Services Tax ("DST") is now intended to cover online advertising. The European Commission proposed an EU directive on a digital services tax regarding certain digital services back in March 2018, but the EU Member States have so far failed to reach consensus. Therefore, some Member States (e.g. France) plan to introduce such a tax on a national level. In Austria, the DST