EU VAT Validator — bulk VIES VAT validation with audit evidence

Validate EU VAT numbers in bulk against VIES, the European Commission's official VAT validation service — and get the official consultation number on every check as audit evidence for tax inspections. Built for finance teams, accountants, and B2B sellers verifying invoices and reverse-charge eligibility.

$5 per 1,000 validations flat — with a low per-run start fee and nothing else. Comparable tools charge $40+ per 1,000.

Use with AI agents (MCP)

This Actor is also an MCP tool — AI agents like Claude and Cursor can run it for you. Your agent can call this tool directly; usage bills through your Apify account.

MCP server URL:

https://mcp.apify.com?tools=apifmcpfactory/eu-vat-validator

Claude Desktop (claude_desktop_config.json):

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "eu-vat-validator": {
            "command": "npx",
            "args": [
                "mcp-remote",
                "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=apifmcpfactory/eu-vat-validator",
                "--header",
                "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Cursor (.cursor/mcp.json):

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "eu-vat-validator": {
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=apifmcpfactory/eu-vat-validator",
            "headers": {
                "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN"
            }
        }
    }
}

Replace YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN with your API token from Apify Console.

No Apify account? AI agents can also pay per call with USDC via the x402 protocol: buy a prepaid token at agi.apify.com and use it as the Bearer token above.

Why this Actor?

• Official audit evidence — provide your own VAT number (requesterVat) and VIES issues a consultation number for every check. That reference is recognised proof that you verified your counterparty's VAT status at that moment — exactly what tax authorities ask for in reverse-charge audits.
• Bulk-safe by design — a 1,000-number batch never dies mid-run. Every input produces exactly one output row: valid, invalid, or a clear per-number error. Automatic retries with backoff ride out VIES's frequent member-state outages.
• Honest, compliant speed — VIES rate-limits all callers and blocks abusive IPs. This Actor validates at ~1–3 numbers per second with gentle concurrency: compliant by design, no IP-blocking risk, no burned batches. A 1,000-number run takes roughly 10–15 minutes and simply works.
• Input tolerance — accepts messy real-world formats (ie 6388047v, DE 811.569.869) and normalises them automatically before checking.

Input

{
    "vatNumbers": ["IE6388047V", "de 811.569-869", "IE0000000A"],
    "requesterVat": "IE8256796U"
}

Output

One dataset item per VAT number — with the consultation number when requesterVat is provided:

{
    "vatNumber": "IE6388047V",
    "countryCode": "IE",
    "valid": true,
    "businessName": "GOOGLE IRELAND LIMITED",
    "address": "3RD FLOOR, GORDON HOUSE, BARROW STREET, DUBLIN 4",
    "consultationNumber": "WAPIAAAAZ97vI0fg",
    "checkedAt": "2026-07-19T18:58:49.289Z"
}

Invalid numbers return valid: false; numbers VIES could not check (member state down after all retries) return an error field — so your spreadsheet always reconciles 1:1 with your input list.

What is VIES VAT validation?

VIES (VAT Information Exchange System) is the European Commission's search engine over the national VAT registries of all 27 EU member states (plus XI for Northern Ireland). Checking a counterparty's VAT number there — and keeping evidence of the check — is the standard way to support zero-rated intra-EU B2B supplies under the reverse-charge mechanism. This Actor is a bulk VAT validation API on top of that official source: an EU VAT number checker that scales from one invoice to your whole ledger, with VAT compliance audit evidence built in.

GDPR & lawful use

All data returned by this Actor comes solely from the European Commission's official VIES service, which publishes it for exactly this purpose: verifying the VAT status of business counterparties. The intended use is B2B invoice and VAT compliance verification. The Actor stores nothing beyond your own run's dataset — no copies, no enrichment, no third-party sources.

FAQ

Do I need requesterVat? No — validation works without it. With it, every check also returns the official VIES consultation number, which is your audit evidence. Recommended for compliance use.

Why not faster? VIES itself is the bottleneck: it rate-limits all callers and temporarily blocks IPs that hammer it. Tools that advertise high concurrency risk blocked runs and half-finished batches. This Actor stays deliberately inside VIES's comfort zone so runs finish reliably.

What if a member state is offline? The Actor retries with increasing pauses. If a country stays down, those numbers get a clear error in the output and the rest of the batch completes normally — rerun just the failed ones later.

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