Check an EU VAT Number Online (VIES): Tool and Audit Proof

Direct answer

To check an EU VAT number, use the [European Commission's VIES service](https://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/vies/): select the customer's Member State, enter the number, and add your own Member State and VAT number as requester. VIES returns valid or invalid and a consultation number. The tool below queries VIES for you, filters typing errors before the query and gives you a downloadable record.

Keep that number with the invoice. It is the timestamped evidence that supports the exemption of your intra-Community supply. Since 1 January 2020, the validity of the customer's number is a substantive condition for that exemption, not a formality. An invalid number, or a check you cannot evidence, and the transaction becomes taxable in Luxembourg.

How to check an EU VAT number on VIES in four steps

Step one: get the number from the customer in writing, with its country prefix. The exemption requires that the customer communicated the number to you. A number you found yourself on the internet is weaker evidence.

Step two: open the European Commission's VIES service, select the customer's Member State and enter the number.

Step three: fill in the requester block with your own Member State and Luxembourg VAT number, which is LU followed by eight digits. Without it, the check runs but no consultation number is issued.

Step four: save the result at once. Keep the number checked, the date and time, the consultation number, the name and address when disclosed, and a link to the invoice concerned.

Beyond a few dozen counterparties, run the same check through the VIES API, where the consultation number comes back in the requestIdentifier field, and store each response automatically.

How to read a VIES result

The costliest confusion is between "invalid" and "service unavailable". Concluding too fast leads to charging local VAT out of caution, which damages the commercial relationship and complicates the correction.

What is the VIES consultation number, and why does it matter?

The consultation number is the unique identifier VIES issues when you supply your own Member State and VAT number as requester. It shows that your company checked that counterparty on that date.

Leave the requester fields empty and the validation still runs, but no identifier is issued. All you keep is a screenshot, which anyone can reproduce and which carries no authentication. In an audit, a screenshot is a weak file and a consultation number is a strong one.

VIES keeps no history

VIES answers in the present tense, never the past. It queries the national databases live and states whether a number is active now. It returns no earlier periods of validity.

A number valid in 2024 and deactivated since will return "invalid" today, with no mention that it was in order when you made your supply. The service is not a standalone database: the issue date, amendments and deregistration date sit with each Member State's authority, the AED for a Luxembourg number.

A check run today therefore proves nothing about your customer's status at a past date. What you did not record at the time of the transaction cannot be reconstructed during an audit.

Why a valid VIES result is not enough to keep the exemption

Article 138 of Directive 2006/112/EC, as amended by Directive (EU) 2018/1910, makes the exemption of an intra-Community supply of goods subject to cumulative conditions. The customer must be VAT-identified in another Member State and must have communicated that number to you. The supplier must have filed a recapitulative statement containing the correct information for the supply. The goods must have been dispatched or transported to another Member State, which is proved separately.

In Luxembourg, the recapitulative statement is filed through eCDF by the 25th of the month following the period. For goods, it is quarterly as long as quarterly intra-Community supplies stay under the EUR 50,000 threshold, monthly above it; our article on VAT return frequency sets out these rhythms. An error is corrected in the corrections section of a later recapitulative statement, not by re-filing the VAT return.

The text contains a safety valve many overlook: the exemption is denied for a defective recapitulative statement only where the supplier cannot duly justify the shortcoming. An error spotted and corrected on your own initiative is not treated like an omission found during an audit. The full regime of that return, from its periodicity to its correction box, is set out in our article on the EC Sales List in Luxembourg.

Proof of transport remains a separate condition. Article 45a of Implementing Regulation (EU) No 282/2011 sets out rebuttable presumptions, not a mandatory standard: the documents must come from two parties independent of each other, of the vendor and of the acquirer. Where the acquirer arranges transport, the vendor must also hold a written statement from that acquirer, by the tenth day of the month following the supply. This is the most common failure point in Ex Works arrangements.

What to keep in the evidence file

The file is built per counterparty and per period. Invoice copies must be kept for ten years in Luxembourg: align the retention of your evidence with that period, not with your invoicing tool's default.

Special numbers that break a standard check

Before concluding that a number is invalid, rule out a data entry error. The table below covers the cases that trip people up most often.

Check the EX suffix at the VAT registration stage of your counterparties. The exemption scheme itself is set out in our article on the Luxembourg VAT exemption.

When a valid number still does not protect you

A valid answer establishes that a number was active at a given moment. It does not establish that your counterparty holds it, impersonation being the classic entry point of carousel fraud. It does not establish that the goods left the territory, nor that the transaction sits outside a fraudulent chain.

The case law of the Court of Justice (Teleos, C-409/04; Mecsek-Gabona, C-273/11; Italmoda, C-131/13, C-163/13 and C-164/13) requires refusing the exemption to an operator who knew, or should have known, that it was taking part in fraud, even where every formal condition is met. The check is a floor, not a ceiling.

The signals that call for enhanced diligence are well known: an unusually large order on the first transaction, delivery requested to a country other than the State of registration, payment by a third party, an abnormally thin margin on high unit-value goods, a contact reachable only by messaging.

The four controls we put in place

First control: check and identity reconciliation when the customer account is opened. Second control: a check before every exempt invoice, automated through the API beyond roughly fifty active counterparties, with the consultation number stored against the invoice. Third control: monthly revalidation of the portfolio, because a registration can be withdrawn mid-relationship without the customer telling you. Fourth control: reconciliation of invoices against the recapitulative statement before it goes through eCDF.

The most frequent break point is the fourth. Companies verify correctly, then file a recapitulative statement built from an accounting extract that does not carry the same numbers as the invoices. The substantive condition falls despite flawless checks.

VIES and the ViDA reform: what changes and when

The ViDA package was formally adopted on 11 March 2025, with Directive (EU) 2025/516. From 1 July 2030, intra-Community B2B transactions move to structured e-invoicing and near real-time digital reporting, which replaces recapitulative statements. Transaction data will flow to a new central VIES platform, and the current VIES is to be phased out afterwards.

The practical consequence does not wait for 2030: a clean customer master file, with every number checked and every consultation number stored, will be required either way. It costs far less to build in normal times than under deadline pressure. Our analysis of Luxembourg VAT in 2026 sets out the calendar, and our tax advisors frame that path with you.

Is a VIES check legally required before an intra-EU sale?

The law makes the validity of the customer's VAT number a condition of the exemption. It does not prescribe one form of proof. The consultation number is the evidence VIES itself provides for that purpose, which is why we treat it as the standard.

How often should I re-check a customer's VAT number?

At onboarding, before every exempt invoice, and monthly for active counterparties. No text sets a fixed frequency. The rule is that you must be able to show the number was valid at the date of each supply.

What if VIES says invalid but my customer insists the number is valid?

Check the prefix and digits, retry later in case of an outage, then ask the customer for confirmation from its tax authority. Document every step. Until the point is resolved, the exemption should not be applied on the strength of the number alone.

Can I check a UK VAT number in VIES?

Not for Great Britain: GB numbers have not been validated in VIES since 1 January 2021. Northern Ireland XI numbers are in VIES for goods.

Is a screenshot of the VIES result enough?

It helps but is weak on its own. Keep the consultation number and the stored result, and treat the screenshot as a supplement.

Sources and limits

This article draws on the European Commission's VIES service and SME-on-the-web tool, on Directives 2006/112/EC, (EU) 2018/1910 and (EU) 2025/516, on Implementing Regulation (EU) No 282/2011 and on the Guichet.lu pages on recapitulative statements.

This article sets out the framework as it stands on 30 October 2026. Thresholds, directives and tools change; any individual decision should be assessed against your own situation.