📊 Taxes & VAT

Serbia's 2027 Tax Changes: What the September 2026 Package Means for a Foreign-Owned Company

On 31 August 2026 the Serbian parliament adopted amendments to eleven tax laws, published in the Official Gazette no. 80/2026 of 1 September 2026. Almost none of it touches your 2026 numbers: the bulk applies from 1 January 2027. Two things, however, apply immediately, and one of the 2027 changes is worth preparing for now rather than in December.

Coverage of Serbian tax legislation in English is thin, so here is the short version for someone running a d.o.o. or a sole trader from abroad.

Nothing in your 2026 calculations changes

Rates and thresholds are untouched for the rest of the year:

Item	2026	Changing in 2027?
Standard VAT rate	20%	no
Reduced VAT rate	10%	no
VAT registration threshold	RSD 8,000,000 in the previous 12 months	no
Corporate income tax	15%	rate unchanged; framework changes
Non-taxable salary allowance	RSD 34,221 per month	adjusted 1 February 2027 as usual
Minimum wage	RSD 371.00 net per hour	RSD 405.00 from 1 January 2027

Your filings for September and the Q3 VAT quarter run exactly as set out in our tax deadline guide for September–October 2026.

The one change with real teeth: the Tax Administration can file for you

Under the amended Law on Tax Procedure and Tax Administration, the Tax Administration may, in prescribed situations, file a return on the taxpayer’s behalf — including the annual personal income tax return and the VAT return — based on the data it holds.

That sounds helpful. It is not. A VAT return assembled by the tax authority is built from output VAT data. Your input VAT — the deductible tax on purchases — lives in your own records, not theirs. A return filed for you will therefore show a liability larger than the real one, and you recover the difference afterwards through an amended return.

Two related amendments make that recoverable rather than catastrophic:

• the previous limit of two amended returns is removed, so corrections are no longer rationed;
• a three-year deadline is introduced for replacing a provisional assessment with a final one; after that the assessed amount stands.

The practical rule for a foreign-owned company has not changed, it has only become more expensive to ignore: file on time even if you cannot pay. A filed-but-unpaid liability costs default interest. An unfiled one now costs default interest on someone else’s estimate of your turnover.

Preliminary VAT returns, for periods starting after 31 December 2026

For tax periods beginning after 31 December 2026, the system will pre-populate a preliminary VAT return from data already recorded electronically, which the taxpayer then confirms or corrects. It is the same direction of travel as the electronic recording of VAT on SEF — one step further along.

The detailed mechanics will come through a rulebook. The one thing worth doing before then is unglamorous: make sure your SEF records are clean. From 2027 they become the source of the draft return, so every unmatched invoice turns into a correction rather than a private inconvenience. If you are not yet clear on how the two SEF obligations differ, start with e-invoicing in Serbia.

What applies immediately

Fiscalisation. Issuing an invalid fiscal receipt — including one whose QR code does not match the actual transaction — now carries a ban on conducting business activity, up to one year under the law. There is no deferred date. If your Serbian company runs a shop, a café or any point of sale, scan one of your own receipts with a phone this week and check that it resolves to the correct record in the Tax Administration system.

Electronic delivery notes (e-otpremnica). The amendments actually narrow the obligation: low-value retail purchases for business entertainment, vouchers, excise stamps, cash and printed press are now excluded, and carriers without system access may present the document via QR code. The general private-sector start date remains 1 October 2027; companies handling excise goods or supplying the public sector have been in scope since 1 January 2026.

Dated for later

• 1 February 2027 — automatic settlement of excise liabilities.
• 1 July 2027 — VAT payers must record purchases of agricultural and forestry products from non-registered farmers on SEF, within 12 days of month-end; export data will be pulled from the Customs Administration system instead of being keyed in.
• 1 January 2027 — corporate income tax is aligned with EU directives on cross-border reorganisations, interest and royalties between associated companies, and anti-tax-avoidance measures (interest limitation, exit taxation, controlled foreign companies). The 15% rate does not change, but some existing reliefs are flagged to end. If your Serbian company sits under a holding elsewhere in Europe, this is the paragraph to take to your tax adviser — see also corporate income tax in Serbia.
• 1 January 2027 — employment tax incentives are realigned with state-aid control rules. Existing users generally keep what they have; new entrants should confirm eligibility before signing the employment contract.

What to do before year-end

1. Change nothing in your 2026 payroll or VAT calculations.
2. If you are fiscalised, verify your receipt QR codes now.
3. Reconcile SEF against your ledger before the December close, not in January.
4. Confirm whether any current employment incentive continues into 2027 before you hire on the assumption that it does.
5. If you handle excise goods or supply the Serbian public sector, check whether the e-otpremnica obligation already applies to you — it began in January 2026, not in 2027.

FAQ

Does the 15% corporate income tax rate change? No. The rate stays at 15%. What changes from 2027 is the surrounding framework and the status of certain reliefs.

Do I need to do anything before 1 January 2027? Only the fiscalisation check and the SEF clean-up. Everything else is a reading exercise until the implementing rulebooks are published.

Will the Tax Administration start filing my VAT returns automatically? Only where you have not filed. Treat it as an enforcement mechanism, not a service.

Where can I read the original texts? Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia no. 80/2026 of 1 September 2026. There is no official English translation; consolidated Serbian texts appear after entry into force.

How we help

We track which parts of a package like this actually reach your company, and tell you before the provision starts to apply rather than after the first penalty. Get in touch, see what accounting services in Serbia covers and what it costs, or start with company formation in Serbia.

Note: this article is general information, current at the date shown. Confirm the final wording in Official Gazette no. 80/2026 or with your accountant before acting on it.