If you are an EU-based company supplying goods or services to other companies within the EU, you are probably applying the reverse charge regulation on your invoices. You are then also (or you should be) checking the VAT ID number of your customers. After all, if that VAT ID number is invalid and your national tax agency comes to audit you, you could be in big trouble…

Checking the VAT ID is fairly simple: you go to the VIES VAT Number Validation website of the European Commision, fill in the country and VAT number and check the results. However simple it is: it does cost you time and effort to do this.

Are you tired of all the time and effort checking these numbers takes you? And are you using Zoho CRM, Zoho Inventory, Zoho Books, Zoho Subscriptions or Zoho Creator? Then look no further! My EU VAT ID Checker integrates with these systems and you can check the number with just a click of a button.

Check out the user guide below!

User guide

Using the extension is childsplay: An extra field is added to your Accounts (CRM) or your Customers (Books, Inventory) module. Please note that the CRM extension is standard and that the other extensions require a custom implementation. Field and button names and locations can be different depending on your wishes in non-CRM applications.

Are you using Zoho Creator? An integration is then completely custom, so a general user guide is not possible to create.

Zoho CRM

In CRM, you will find the “EU VAT ID” in the main block of information in every record under “Accounts”. Enter the full VAT ID number in that field (including the country code, so for Zoho: NL855264263B01). Save the field and simply press the “Check EU VAT” button on the top right:

This will check the EU database against the number you entered. The returned information will be displayed in a pop-up box, like so:

Is the information correct? Great! Your customer gave you the right information and you can send the Reverse Charge invoice with confidence. If you need to, you can manually copy information from the pop-up into the required fields immediately. Handy, if the company name was slightly off or you were missing the street number. The EU VAT ID Check status will change to “Valid”.

If you’ve entered an invalid VAT ID number, this will be shown in a message, and the EU VAT ID Check status will change to “Inalid”. An invalid number has the proper EU VAT ID format, but is not registered. In the below example, it is missing the “B01” at the end:

If you enter a VAT ID from a non-EU country, you will get the notification that it is not a proper EU VAT number. This happens when you enter a UK number, but also a US number, as shown here:

Zoho Books, Zoho Inventory and Zoho Subscriptions

Field and button names and locations can be different depending on your wishes, but the general principals are the same. In your application, go to “Customers”, select the customer and then click “Edit”. Under “Custom field” you will find the EU VAT fields:

Save the record. Now you can click the “Check EU VAT” button when you view the record and you see the EU VAT number is filled out:

This will check the EU database against the number you entered. The returned information will be displayed in a pop-up box, like so:

Also, a comment will be generated, storing this information. This is done because the pop-up is only visible for a couple of seconds:

Is the information correct? Great! Your customer gave you the right information and you can send the Reverse Charge invoice with confidence. If you need to, you can manually copy information from the comment into the required fields immediately. Handy, if the company name was slightly off or you were missing the street number.

Other notifications, as seen in the CRM user guide, are not saved in the Comments, but will only show on your screen for a short time.