The Ministry of Economy and Finance announced, with press release no. 31, an imminent legislative provision to amend the 2026 Budget Law (199/2025). The intervention will serve to correct three different areas: the tax on small non-EU shipments, the rules on the VAT tax base in trade-ins and the geographical requirements for access to hyper-depreciation of capital goods.
Changes which, according to the note, serve to guarantee legal certainty and allow the technical adaptation of customs IT systems, avoiding bureaucratic blocks that would affect consumers and businesses. Let’s see how the 2026 Budget law changes.
Tax on non-EU parcels: when will it be postponed?
The first point of the press release from the Ministry of Economy and Finance of 12 March 2026 concerns the postponement of the application of the administrative contribution on imports with a value of less than 150 euros.
The tax on packages coming from outside the European Union, provided for in the 2026 budget law in articles 126-128, has slipped. The reason is that more time is needed to adapt the information system of the Customs and Monopolies Agency. It is therefore a technical necessity, because the information system requires a structural update to be able to process all these micropayments without causing bottlenecks in deliveries.
The Mef has thus arranged a postponement which activates the rule after 30 June 2026. For citizens this means that nothing changes until the end of June and immediate increases in shipments of less than 150 euros from non-EU countries are thus avoided.
Clarifications on VAT
The second intervention concerns the VAT tax base in exchange operations and in payments (art. 1, paragraph 139). The new legislation establishes that the tax is calculated on the total amount of costs incurred.
The ministry has not changed the legislation, but has specified the temporal scope of application. In fact, the new criterion will apply exclusively to contracts stipulated or renewed starting from 1 January 2026.
This means that for all agreements concluded before this date, the “normal value” criterion continues to apply. A distinction which, as the note specifies, is fundamental to respect the principle of legitimate expectations.
Private companies that had already planned exchanges and transactions based on the old rates and assessments will therefore not see their plans upset.
Hyper-depreciation: European production constraint removed
Finally, the Government decides to modify the provisions on hyper-depreciation (paragraphs 427 to 436). This is the tax incentive for owners of business income who invest in new capital goods.
The geographical restriction is eliminated and it will therefore no longer be necessary for the goods to be produced exclusively in Europe or in states belonging to the European Economic Area to access the increase in the acquisition cost.
