VAT: professional organizations received at Bercy after the suspension of a criticized measure

The Minister of Commerce and SMEs, Véronique Louwagie, will meet with professional organizations, particularly microentrepreneurs, on Friday, February 7, after an outcry that led to the suspension of the reduction in the VAT exemption threshold planned in the 2025 budget, her office said.

The "interprofessional federations, self-employed federations and consular chambers" will be received at 11:30 a.m. at Bercy, the ministry specified.

The 2025 budget plans to lower the threshold below which microenterprises are not subject to value added tax (VAT) to 1 euros of annual turnover on March 25.000, instead of the current 37.500 euros for the provision of services and 85.000 euros for commercial activities. A provision that concerns hundreds of thousands of self-employed entrepreneurs.

After strong reactions, the Minister of the Economy Eric Lombard announced his suspension on Thursday evening, the time for a consultation to "adjust this measure if necessary".

Pending the conclusions, "companies and other organisations are not required to carry out the new VAT reporting procedures", confirmed a press release from Bercy issued after Mr Lombard's intervention.

The measure, which will force newly taxed micro-enterprises to charge their customers 20% more in order to collect VAT and pay it to the State, has been criticised by political parties of all stripes, from LFI to RN and some Macronists.

Even lowered to 25.000 euros, this new threshold would spare the majority of microentrepreneurs: the 1,3 million active microentrepreneurs (who declare a turnover) recorded by INSEE at the end of June 2022 declared an average of 4.907 euros of activity per quarter, or 19.600 euros per year.