A brand sends you a package worth 600 euro. You make content about it. Not a euro reaches your account. Even so you have just booked 600 euro of turnover, and you have 600 euro of costs or a capital asset. That sounds like an accounting nicety, and it is the point at which most creators have a hole in their records.
An exchange is two transactions
Fiscally an exchange does not exist as one event. There are two supplies:
- You supply a service: content, reach, a mention, usage rights to your material.
- The brand supplies you with a good or a service: the product, the treatment, the trip.
Both have a value, and both belong in your records. Your turnover goes up by the value of what you receive, and against it stands a cost or a capital asset of the same value.
For a product you consume or that is worth little, the effect on your profit is nil: turnover added, costs added, net nothing. For a more expensive product lasting several years it is not, because turnover then stands against an investment you depreciate over years. The exchange then raises your profit in the year itself. That is exactly the scenario that surprises creators: receiving a 3,000 euro camera can produce a tax assessment without any money having come in.
Establishing the value
The measure is the value in commercial terms: what the product normally costs. Usable sources, in this order:
- The amount the brand itself names in the agreement or on the delivery note
- The regular selling price, including VAT if that is the consumer price
- The price at which the product is commonly offered at that moment
What does not work: the list price of a product structurally sold at a discount, and least of all a value the brand names to make the deal sound bigger. That happens, and it is your turnover that gets inflated by it. Put in your records what the thing realistically costs and record what you based that on.
With part money and part product you add both together. A deal of 500 euro plus a package of 300 euro is 800 euro of turnover.
VAT on an exchange
VAT follows the same logic: there are two supplies, and VAT can be due on both. You invoice your service to the brand, and the brand supplies you with a good.
For the treatment on your side the ordinary rule applies: where is your customer?
- Dutch brand. You invoice with Dutch VAT. That means you have to account for VAT on the value of the package, and you do not receive it in money from the brand. Allow for that.
- Brand elsewhere in the EU. Reverse charged, and the amount belongs in your ICP return. See the ICP return.
- Brand outside the EU. Outside Dutch VAT.
That first point is the most practical risk in this whole article. On a barter deal with a Dutch brand you have to account for VAT on an amount you received in products. That VAT has to come out of your own pocket. On a 1,000 euro package that is well over 200 euro gone on a deal with no money in it.
The way to solve that is not fiscal but commercial: agree that the brand pays the VAT in money on top, or ask for part of the fee in money. That is a normal conversation and brands that work with creators regularly know it.
What to agree and record
For a barter deal you want on paper:
- What you supply: how many posts, which platforms, which usage rights, for how long
- What you receive, with a concrete value
- Whether the VAT is paid on top in money
- Whether you may keep the product or have to return it
Point 4 changes the whole treatment. If you may keep it, it is an exchange. If you have to return it, you have only supplied a service and received nothing. If you get it on loan for a period, you are somewhere in between. That difference is not something to reconstruct afterwards.
When a package is not turnover
Not every package is a deal. Products sent unsolicited with no agreement attached are not a fee for a supply. Get a tube of cream from a brand hoping you will post something, with no agreement and no obligation, and you have supplied nothing.
The line sits at the agreement. As soon as there is an expectation or an arrangement, however informal, there is a supply. A DM in which you say you are going to do something with it is an agreement.
Post of your own accord about a product you received unsolicited and it becomes harder to defend that nothing stood against it. In practice the advice is simple: record it from the moment you post about it.
A worked example
In one year a creator does three barter deals: a package of grooming products worth 400 euro, a lighting set worth 1,200 euro, and a hotel stay worth 650 euro. All three with Dutch parties.
Turnover: 2,250 euro. VAT is due on that, well over 470 euro at the high rate, unless something else was agreed.
On the cost side: the grooming products were consumed, so 400 euro of costs. The hotel stay, if it was business, 650 euro of costs. The lighting set is a capital asset above the threshold, so she depreciates it over five years and the first year yields only part of it. See deduct or depreciate.
Net effect on her profit that year: positive, so more tax, while no money came in. That is not a fault in the system, it is the reason to ask for a cash component on larger barter deals.
What to record in a collaboration agreement
Barter deals almost always happen through a DM and rarely through a contract, and that is exactly why they become fiscally untidy. You do not need a lawyer, but you do need four lines on paper. An email with those four points that the other party replies to with a yes is enough.
- What you supply. Number of posts, which platforms, how long they stay up, whether the brand may reuse the material and where.
- What you get, with an amount. Not "a package" but a value. This is the figure that goes into your records.
- Whether the VAT is paid on top in money. With a Dutch brand this is the question that costs you money if you do not ask it.
- Whether you keep it, return it or borrow it. This decides whether anything was received at all.
That last point changes the whole story for a loan: equipment you may use for a month and then return is not a good received. You have then only supplied a service, and the fee for it is nil or the cash amount that came with it.
The usage rights to your material are worth something too
An element creators give away without naming it: the brand's right to use your content on its own channels, in advertising or on the website. That is a separate supply with its own value, and in the advertising world it is a well-known item.
Fiscally it makes no difference in treatment, it sits in the same turnover. Commercially it does: a deal in which the brand may put your content into paid advertising for a year is worth more than a post that sinks after a week. If you do not name it separately, it gets taken along for free.
Products you buy in order to review them
The other direction, and it often occurs alongside. Buy a product yourself in order to make content about it and that is a purchase for your work and therefore deductible. Two conditions are where it comes unstuck.
The review has to be the purpose, not an afterthought. A product you wanted anyway and then post something about is a private purchase with a post attached. And if you keep the product afterwards and use it privately, you take it out of your business at its value at that moment. That is a withdrawal, not a cost.
Practically: with purchases like this, briefly record why you made it and what content came out of it. One line with the receipt. In an audit that is the difference between a deductible purchase and a struck private expense.
Frequently asked questions
I get a free treatment in exchange for content. Turnover too?
Yes, the same logic: you supply a service and receive a service. The value is what the treatment normally costs. Whether the treatment is a deductible cost on your side is a second question, and for treatments to your body the answer is often no. See clothing, lingerie and cosmetics.
And a trip that is paid for in full?
Turnover to the value of the trip. Whether the trip is business on your side depends on the programme and the reason for it. See travel costs and content days.
What if I throw the product away or give it away after a month?
That changes nothing about the moment of receipt. Giving it to someone else can have a treatment of its own.
Do I have to send an invoice if no money is coming?
Yes. There is a supply, so there should be an invoice. That invoice states the value of your service and the VAT belonging to it. It is also your evidence for the value you used.
In closing
An exchange feels free and fiscally it is not. The practical rule: record the value at the moment of the deal, and on packages of any significance ask for a cash component so you can pay the VAT.
We take this in as standard with bookkeeping for content creators, where brand deals are often a larger part of turnover than the platform itself.