Vertex Talks VAT and Chain Flow Accelerator

By: Rizal Ahmed, Chief Research Officer, and Ogo Nwanyanwu, Research Director, Financial Management & Technology

Growing e-filing requirements and VAT regulation updates continue to elevate the cost burden and risk quotient associated with indirect tax management.  Organizations navigating international trade activity in the current environment, are seeing new regulations and tax guidelines create supply chain uncertainty. Across the Europe Union, new and more comprehensive VAT rate schedules were released to modernize digital tax administration around cross-border, e-commerce business models. New VAT e-commerce rules, in effect as of July 1st, 2021, acknowledge an explicit focus on ensuring “VAT is paid where consumption of goods takes place,” according to the European Commission website. This recent regulatory update illustrates the challenges facing global organizations and tax teams, due to rapidly changing, digital tax compliance requirements.  

For organizations managing cross-border business activity and e-commerce business models, VAT compliance is critical to supply chain security. To minimize supply chain risk, CFOs are prioritizing compliance visibility with a shift to real-time auditability within global organizations. SAP ERP systems offer can streamlined solutions for storing transaction data, to support electronic audit trails. Yet, the data stored in SAP ERP systems, requires data processing for submission to a Tax Engine, automated tax determination tasks.  

The Vertex ‘Indirect Tax Chain Flow Accelerator (CFA)” provides tax professionals with a visualization tool to support a more streamlined, chain flow data mapping process for enhanced VAT determinations. Within SAP ECC or SAP S/4HANA, tax teams can leverage the CFA for intelligent mapping of over 80 relevant VAT tax data fields, stored in SAP ERP tables.  Organizations can improve VAT determination accuracy by first performing an interpretation of the data, prior to tax engine submission.  

You can read more about how to streamline chain flow data mapping in SAP ERP tax systems with the Vertex Chain Flow Accelerator, here:

Reduce E-Filing Complexity with Intelligent VAT-related Data Mapping 

Processing supplier invoice data stored in SAP ERP tables, can require inefficient and manual processes or deep customizations. Manual processes are error prone and customizations are costly to maintain. Both require additional workforce resources to support. SAPinsider sat with Vertex Experts, Roger Lindelauf, SAP/VAT Professional, and Brian Wilchusky, Director of Global SAP Partnerships, to discuss how global organizations can potentially target more efficient tax determination strategies with the Vertex Indirect Tax CFA.