Introduction
VAT Engine documentation for EU VAT calculation, connected-source order reporting, rates, source profiles, integrations, and OSS/IOSS compliance workflows.
What is VAT Engine?
VAT Engine is an alpha EU VAT calculation and compliance platform under active development. It serves VAT-rate data sourced from the official EU TEDB (Taxes in Europe Database) and supports all 27 EU member states with 37 curated tax classes. Current functionality is free during the alpha, but users should review their output and should not treat VAT Engine as filing, legal, or tax advice.
Key Features
- EU-wide coverage — All 27 EU member states with standard and reduced VAT rates.
- 37 tax classes — Standard, food, books, pharmaceuticals, accommodation, and more — derived from the official EU TEDB.
- Accurate calculations — Integer arithmetic in minor currency units (cents) to avoid floating-point errors.
- Recorded-date rate lookup — Query a past or present date where recorded/imported rate history provides coverage. Current live TEDB apply windows are not yet guaranteed legal-applicability intervals.
- Compliance tracking — Shopify and other connected-source orders feed the committed supply ledger, Country Exposure, VAT Rate Mix, Turnover Trend, and filtered CSV exports. API calculation requests remain available in a separate audit view. Filing Prep, OSS/IOSS previews, locked returns, source tags, and ECB-backed EUR normalization use the committed supply-event record.
- SME thresholds — EU Small Business Scheme exemption and cash-accounting thresholds for all 27 member states, including national-currency amounts for non-eurozone countries.
- Simple REST API — JSON request/response with straightforward authentication via API keys.
- Self-service API keys — Generate, rotate, and revoke API keys from the dashboard.
- Secure account dashboard — Manage profile details, account ID, subscription access, password changes, 2FA, and backup-code regeneration from self-service dashboard pages.
- Integrations workspace — Connect supported storefronts, map stores and channels to reporting sources, preview imported activity, monitor synchronization, and review privacy or classification actions from the dashboard.
Immutable TEDB rate-data versions, source fingerprints, knowledge-time selection, and exact snapshot-pinned calculation replay are planned. Current date-indexed lookup uses recorded/imported windows, can reflect when a live change was applied, and does not prove either the legal start date or the exact upstream TEDB response from which an older answer was derived.
Quick Example
curl -X POST https://api.vat-engine.app/v1/vat/calculate \-H "X-API-Key: YOUR_API_KEY" \-H "Content-Type: application/json" \-d '{ "country": "DE", "currency": "EUR", "gross_amount_minor": 11900, "price_includes_vat": true, "tax_class_id": "standard"}'Response:
{
"country": "DE",
"currency": "EUR",
"vat_rate_bps": 1900,
"gross_amount_minor": 11900,
"net_amount_minor": 10000,
"vat_amount_minor": 1900
}