Pro pricing: TBD — stay tuned

Troubleshooting

Overview

This page covers the most common issues users encounter with EU VAT OSS for WooCommerce and how to resolve them.

Wrong order classification

Symptoms

An order is classified as Domestic when it should be EU B2C, or vice versa. A B2B order appears as B2C despite the customer providing a VAT number.

Causes and solutions

Incorrect home country setting — The most common cause. Go to WooCommerce > EU VAT OSS > Settings > General and verify your home country is set correctly. If you change it, future orders will be classified based on the new setting. Existing orders are not reclassified automatically.

Missing or incorrect customer address — Classification is based on the customer’s shipping country (or billing country if no shipping address is provided). If the address is wrong, the classification will be wrong. Correct the address on the order and the plugin will reclassify it.

VAT number not captured — If the VAT number field is hidden in Display settings, B2B customers cannot enter their number and will be classified as B2C. Ensure the checkout VAT field is set to “Show for EU countries only” or “Always show.”

VAT number validation failed — If the VIES service was unavailable when the order was placed, the order defaults to B2C. Check the order’s EU VAT OSS meta box for a “VIES unavailable” flag and manually reclassify if needed.

Threshold mismatch

Symptoms

The threshold total shown in the dashboard does not match what you expect when manually adding up your orders.

Causes and solutions

Refunded orders — Fully refunded orders are subtracted from the threshold total. If you recently issued refunds, the total will be lower than expected. Partially refunded orders count at their post-refund amount.

Order status filter — Only orders with statuses selected in Settings count toward the threshold. By default, this includes Processing and Completed. If you have orders in other statuses (e.g., On Hold), they are not counted.

Currency conversion — If you use multi-currency (Pro), the threshold is tracked in EUR. Your order amounts in other currencies are converted, which may differ from a simple manual calculation.

B2B orders included in mental math — Remember that EU B2B orders do not count toward the threshold. If you are adding up all EU orders manually, exclude the B2B ones.

Notification not sent

Symptoms

You expected to receive a threshold alert or digest email but nothing arrived.

Causes and solutions

Notifications disabled — Go to WooCommerce > EU VAT OSS > Settings > Notifications and confirm the “Enable notifications” toggle is on.

Wrong recipients — Verify the email addresses in the Recipients field. A typo in an email address means that recipient will not receive notifications.

Warning threshold not reached — The “Threshold approaching” notification only triggers when your sales reach the configured warning percentage (default: 80%). If you are at 75%, the notification has not triggered yet. Lower the warning percentage if you want earlier alerts.

Email delivery issues — WordPress sends emails through your server’s mail function by default, which is unreliable on many hosts. Install a mail plugin like WP Mail SMTP to route emails through a proper SMTP service.

Digest timing — The digest email is sent on a schedule (daily, weekly, or monthly). If you just changed the frequency, the next digest will arrive at the next scheduled time.

Dashboard widget not visible

If the EU VAT OSS dashboard widget does not appear on your WordPress admin dashboard:

  1. Go to Dashboard > Home.
  2. Click Screen Options at the top right of the page.
  3. Check the box next to EU VAT OSS.
  4. The widget will appear on the dashboard.

Slow performance

If the plugin overview page or reports load slowly:

  • Large order volume — Stores with tens of thousands of orders may experience slower report generation. Use date filters to limit the data set.
  • Database optimization — Run a database optimization plugin to ensure your WooCommerce order tables are indexed properly.
  • Caching conflicts — Some caching plugins cache admin pages. Add the WooCommerce admin pages to your caching plugin’s exclusion list.

Getting further help

If the solutions above do not resolve your issue:

  1. Check the changelog to see if your issue was addressed in a recent update.
  2. Visit the support page to contact us directly.
  3. Include your WordPress version, WooCommerce version, plugin version, and a description of the issue with screenshots if possible.