Note that Stripe also allows configuring whether VAT is included in the price or not. In my case, I prefer to exclude it from the price.
This works nicely, but depending on your accountant, he will or you will struggle when reporting numbers since Stripe reports almost never directly include all the data that your accountant wants or needs.
On my side, I had to write a script to extract and classify data based on my accountant's needs. For instance, I have to know my revenue per country for customers with no VAT numbers (individuals) and the amount of VAT collected.
In the case of customers with a VAT number (companies), reverse charge applies, except for companies legally based in the same country as me (I am based in France). I need to know the total revenue for companies in the European Union, the total revenue for companies outside the European Union, and the total revenue for companies exempted from VAT by an express provision of the law. This last case happened to me only once when making a Stripe invoice to the OECD organization.
Then, things become a bit more complex when Stripe informs you that you need to register in some other countries, that you register and need to collect taxes for other countries. I guess your accountant will be happy to help.
Another issue for me was dealing with multiple currencies and conversions. Stripe takes a fee for the conversion but does not put it in the fee column in its reports. The Stripe fee for currency conversion is "transparently" included in the conversion rate, which does not match the market rate. More subtly, some reports use the conversion rate with the fee deducted while others use the conversion rate with the fee included! It took me a long time to understand why the numbers were not matching after some computations due to this.
Regarding whether to charge 21% when Stripe shows 0%, we most probably don't have enough context to really help, and, as suggested by others, the best is to consult with your accountant. However, Stripe Tax seems to work quite well and is used for millions of transactions, so I would first trust Stripe over your accountant without a very clear explanation.
I did use Stripe Tax and invoicing.
Note that Stripe also allows configuring whether VAT is included in the price or not. In my case, I prefer to exclude it from the price.
This works nicely, but depending on your accountant, he will or you will struggle when reporting numbers since Stripe reports almost never directly include all the data that your accountant wants or needs.
On my side, I had to write a script to extract and classify data based on my accountant's needs. For instance, I have to know my revenue per country for customers with no VAT numbers (individuals) and the amount of VAT collected.
In the case of customers with a VAT number (companies), reverse charge applies, except for companies legally based in the same country as me (I am based in France). I need to know the total revenue for companies in the European Union, the total revenue for companies outside the European Union, and the total revenue for companies exempted from VAT by an express provision of the law. This last case happened to me only once when making a Stripe invoice to the OECD organization.
Then, things become a bit more complex when Stripe informs you that you need to register in some other countries, that you register and need to collect taxes for other countries. I guess your accountant will be happy to help.
Another issue for me was dealing with multiple currencies and conversions. Stripe takes a fee for the conversion but does not put it in the fee column in its reports. The Stripe fee for currency conversion is "transparently" included in the conversion rate, which does not match the market rate. More subtly, some reports use the conversion rate with the fee deducted while others use the conversion rate with the fee included! It took me a long time to understand why the numbers were not matching after some computations due to this.
Regarding whether to charge 21% when Stripe shows 0%, we most probably don't have enough context to really help, and, as suggested by others, the best is to consult with your accountant. However, Stripe Tax seems to work quite well and is used for millions of transactions, so I would first trust Stripe over your accountant without a very clear explanation.
Ok thank you for the long response! I might have to create some tools to get the right data for my accountant as well I think at some point.