VAT refund
Reclaiming the VAT on your home battery
If you use your home battery to buy and sell electricity, the Dutch tax authority (Belastingdienst) sees you as an entrepreneur for VAT purposes. That lets you reclaim the VAT on the purchase and the installation. Below is how that works and where it goes wrong in practice.
Free eligibility check
Do you qualify?
Tick what applies to your situation. The more points, the more likely it is that you can reclaim the VAT.
Four points that together decide whether the tax authority sees you as a VAT entrepreneur. Unsure about one of them? Ask your question through the form below.
How to reclaim the VAT
Seven steps, from registration to your periodic return. Follow them in order and keep all your paperwork along the way.
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Make sure everything is in the same name
For the tax authority the details have to be consistent. Check before or right at purchase that the invoice for the battery, the installation invoice, the energy contract and the feed-in payment are in the name of the same person — the one reclaiming the VAT.
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Register as a VAT entrepreneur
You do that with the tax authority using the form “Opgaaf startende onderneming: eenmanszaak” (declaration of a starting sole trader). Registration with the Chamber of Commerce is not needed. You are seen as an entrepreneur here only for VAT, because you buy and sell electricity with your home battery.
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Wait for your VAT number and gather your paperwork
You get a VAT number and information about how and when to file. In the meantime, keep the purchase invoice for the home battery, the installation invoice, your energy contract with the details of the dynamic tariff, the EMS data from the app, and the overviews of feed-in and payments.
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Reclaim the VAT through your return
You reclaim the VAT on purchase and installation in your VAT return. Do that as soon as possible, and in any case within six months of the end of the year in which you bought the battery.
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File periodically after that
If you use the battery to trade electricity, you remain an entrepreneur for VAT. You then file periodically — in practice usually quarterly — on the payment you receive. In plain terms: you first reclaim the VAT on the purchase, and after that you remit VAT on what you receive.
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Allow for private use
If you also use the battery for your own consumption — almost always the case — the tax authority may ask for a correction for private use. You then pay VAT annually on the private share, determined from your EMS data and energy bills. So a good EMS does not only help with smart control, it also makes visible what was trade and what was not.
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Watch the small-business scheme — this is where it usually goes wrong
The Dutch small-business scheme (kleineondernemersregeling, KOR) is a VAT exemption for small entrepreneurs, and many private individuals with solar panels are already registered for it. If you take part in the KOR, you cannot in principle simply reclaim the VAT on the battery; for that you usually have to deregister in time. Taking part again later can affect your refund. Always have your KOR situation assessed in advance by a VAT specialist or tax adviser.
What does it come to?
A simple example. What you actually get back depends on your situation and on how the battery is used.
- Home battery including VAT
- € 6,050
- VAT amount (21%)
- € 1,050
- Potentially reclaimable
- € 1,050
Please note: this guide is an indicative explanation of information from the Dutch tax authority and is not tax advice. Whether you qualify, and exactly how much you get back, depends on your personal situation. Always have that situation — and certainly your KOR status — assessed in advance by a VAT specialist or tax adviser.
Not sure whether this applies to you?
Ask us. We do not do the sums for you at the tax authority, but we can explain what an EMS records and which documents you need. Would you rather finance than pay in one go? Then also look at incentives and financing.