Short answer
Two distinct parts of the EU Directive on Administrative Cooperation are commonly involved.
DAC6 requires an EU-connected intermediary—or, in specified cases, the relevant taxpayer—to report a cross-border arrangement that has at least one statutory hallmark. Some hallmarks apply only where obtaining a tax advantage is a main expected benefit; others do not. The ordinary deadline is 30 days from the earliest reporting trigger.
DAC7 requires a reporting platform operator to identify reportable sellers and report consideration from relevant activities: property rental, personal services, sale of goods and rental of transport. Reporting is generally annual, by 31 January following the reportable calendar year.
Neither regime makes an arrangement unlawful or platform receipts taxable merely because they are reported. Each creates an information obligation. The relevant national implementing law remains essential for filing mechanics, penalties, privilege and interpretation.
Businesses should screen arrangements when designed and collect seller data during onboarding, because both regimes can trigger before ordinary tax-return preparation.
DAC6 asks four threshold questions
A sensible DAC6 review proceeds in this order:
- Is there an arrangement, potentially including several steps?
- Is it cross-border under the Directive's connecting conditions?
- Does at least one Annex IV hallmark apply, and does that hallmark require the main-benefit test?
- Who must report, in which Member State and by what date?
A cross-border arrangement involves more than one Member State, or a Member State and third country, plus a statutory connection such as different residences, a foreign permanent establishment or a possible effect on automatic exchange or beneficial-ownership identification.
The statutory definition is deliberately risk-based:
A reportable cross-border arrangement is “any cross-border arrangement that contains at least one of the hallmarks set out in Annex IV”. —
Domestic arrangements are outside the EU DAC6 definition, though national law may impose wider domestic disclosure duties.
A hallmark is not the same as proven avoidance
Annex IV's five hallmark categories cover confidentiality or success fees, standardised structures, loss buying, income conversion, circular transactions, specified cross-border payments, double relief, avoidance of reporting or beneficial-ownership transparency, and transfer-pricing features.
Categories A and B, and specified parts of category C, require the main-benefit test. It is met where, considering all facts and circumstances, the main benefit or one of the main benefits a person may reasonably expect is obtaining a tax advantage. Other hallmarks—particularly specified exchange-of-information, beneficial-ownership and transfer-pricing hallmarks—do not depend on that test.
Reporting therefore does not establish abuse. In Belgian Association of Tax Lawyers, the Court upheld the regime against broad legal-certainty and privacy challenges and observed that it can also cover lawful arrangements. It stressed that the filer reports information within their knowledge, possession or control rather than conducting an unlimited investigation.
The intermediary normally reports first
An intermediary includes a person that designs, markets, organises, makes available or manages implementation of a reportable arrangement. It also includes a person providing aid, assistance or advice who knows or could reasonably be expected to know of that involvement, assessed in light of available information and relevant expertise.
The intermediary must also have an EU link: tax residence, a relevant permanent establishment, incorporation or governing law, or registration with an EU professional association for legal, tax or consultancy services.
An adviser is not automatically an intermediary because a client has a cross-border transaction. Role, knowledge and available information matter, and the adviser may prove that reportable involvement could not reasonably have been known.
Where several intermediaries participate, each is in principle obliged but may rely on proof of equivalent filing. The Directive's ordered rules resolve multiple possible filing states.
When the taxpayer must report
The relevant taxpayer takes over where there is no reportable intermediary, or where the obligation shifts under an applicable privilege waiver and no other intermediary reports.
The taxpayer is the person to whom the arrangement is available, who is ready to implement it or who implemented its first step. Priority rules and proof of another taxpayer's filing address multiple taxpayers.
The DAC6 clock usually runs for 30 days
For a promoter intermediary, the 30-day period begins on the day after the earliest of:
- the arrangement being made available for implementation;
- the arrangement being ready for implementation; or
- the first implementation step being made.
Service-provider intermediaries report within 30 days after providing aid, assistance or advice. A relevant taxpayer applies an equivalent earliest-event test. Marketable arrangements also require quarterly updates when new reportable information becomes available.
Waiting for a tax return, final legal documents or an authority enquiry can therefore be too late. Organisations need a transaction-screening trigger at design and approval stage.
Legal professional privilege has a protected core
DAC6 permits Member States to waive an intermediary's filing duty where reporting would breach legal professional privilege under national law. But EU fundamental rights constrain how the shifted obligation operates.
In Orde van Vlaamse Balies, the Court held invalid the requirement that a privileged lawyer-intermediary notify other intermediaries who were not the lawyer's client. Revealing the lawyer's identity, consultation and assessment interfered with Article 7 of the Charter and was not strictly necessary because other intermediaries had their own duties and the taxpayer could notify them.
The notification obligation was invalid where it required a lawyer to disclose information to “another intermediary which is not his or her client”. —
The Court later clarified in Belgian Association of Tax Lawyers that this invalidity protects lawyer titles covered by Directive 98/5, not automatically accountants, tax advisers or other professionals. Ordre des avocats du barreau de Luxembourg confirms strengthened protection for lawyer-client legal advice regardless of field. Privilege is not a reason for the transaction team to ignore DAC6.
DAC7 starts with the platform, activity and seller
DAC7 applies to software that connects sellers to users to carry out a relevant activity and includes arrangements for collecting and paying consideration. Software that exclusively processes payments, lists or advertises, or redirects users without further intervention is excluded from the platform definition.
A reporting operator generally has EU residence, incorporation, management or a permanent establishment. A non-EU operator facilitating activity by EU reportable sellers or EU property rental may also need to register and report unless equivalent non-EU exchange applies.
The relevant activities performed for consideration are:
- rental of immovable property, including residential, commercial and parking property;
- personal services;
- sale of tangible goods; and
- rental of any mode of transport.
Employment performed by a seller for the platform operator or its related entity is excluded. Advertising revenue or other activity outside the defined list should not be forced into DAC7 merely because a platform pays it.
Not every seller is reportable
A reportable seller is an active seller, other than an excluded seller, resident in a Member State or renting immovable property located there. Platforms must perform due diligence to establish identity and residence, collecting and validating details such as name, address, tax identification number, date of birth or business registration number, VAT number where available, and relevant permanent establishments.
Excluded sellers include governmental entities, listed entities and their related entities, and specified high-volume property providers. There is also a small-goods-seller exclusion where both conditions are met during the year: fewer than 30 facilitated goods sales and no more than EUR 2,000 total consideration.
That de minimis rule is often misunderstood. It applies to sale of goods, not property rental or personal services. A seller with 29 goods transactions but EUR 2,100 is not excluded; nor is one with 30 transactions and EUR 1,000.
What and when the platform reports
The platform reports operator and seller identity, residence, financial-account information where available, consideration paid or credited for each quarter, fees or taxes withheld or charged, and additional property details for rentals. Due diligence is generally completed by 31 December of the reportable period and information is filed by 31 January of the following year. The seller must also receive specified information about what is reported.
Reporting is due “no later than 31 January of the year following the calendar year” in which the seller is reportable. —
DAC7 reports gross consideration and identifiers; it does not decide the seller's taxable profit, employment status, VAT treatment or entitlement to deductions. Those remain governed by the relevant tax laws.
DAC8 and DAC9 are separate reporting tracks
introduced reporting and due diligence for crypto-asset service providers for reportable periods from 1 January 2026. It does not convert ordinary DAC7 goods, services or property activity into crypto reporting. concerns exchange of Pillar Two top-up-tax information. Neither changes the DAC6/DAC7 tests explained here.
Conclusion
DAC6 and DAC7 address different information gaps. DAC6 follows a cross-border arrangement, its hallmarks, the people who designed or assisted it, and a fast 30-day clock. DAC7 follows a platform's relevant activities, seller due diligence and annual consideration reporting.
The defensible approach is early classification and evidence. Hallmark reviews, role allocation, privilege analysis, seller onboarding and filing proof should be built into the transaction or platform workflow. A report is not a finding of avoidance or tax liability—but missing a report can create a separate compliance breach.
Sources
This article provides general legal information, not advice for a specific matter. Laws, facts and procedural deadlines may change the result. Follow the linked primary sources and obtain local advice before acting.