The EU VAT directives that became active in January 2015 state that any businesses selling digital goods or services to EU consumers have to charge VAT at the consumers local rate and pay it to the consumers local tax authority. There are also some hefty requirements about collection of non-contradictory evidence of the consumers location in case of audit.

I believe there are other countries who have similar legislation, and Australia are coming up with their own being dubbed the Netflix Tax.

I am curious to know how startups from around the world are dealing with this, if at all. Is it a priority, and if not why not? Is there a technical barrier to becoming compliant, and if there were a simple solution would you do it and what might it look like?

I presume the main reason for companies outside the EU not complying with this particular legislation is that EU tax authorities have no jurisdiction over US companies, and can’t impose it upon them.