For tax advisers
Tax advisers for influencers: your creator clients, sorted before the handover.
Creators arrive at the firm with DMs, PR packages, six payout portals and screenshots. Affliq is the tool on the client's side: it records deals, invoices, in-kind benefits and platform payouts through the year and hands you a package you can work with.
The shoebox, digitised.
What firms say about influencer clients.
“My influencer client received 40 parcels. Which were income?”
In the tax administration's view, a product the creator may keep after the promotion is business income at the usual retail price. Affliq records every product with value, business share and history: kept, used up, returned, given away. The assessment stays with you.1
“Who pays the YouTube money, and from where?”
Platforms settle by self-billing credit note, mostly from Ireland, Luxembourg or the US. Affliq maintains the master data of the common platforms, billing entity, country and VAT ID, and assigns every imported payout its tax case: Germany, reverse charge EU or third country, foreign currency at the ECB reference rate.
“Reverse charge or not?”
Services to businesses are supplied at the recipient's seat. Affliq derives the tax case from the partner's seat and VAT ID, puts the note that the recipient owes the tax on the invoice and prepares the Zusammenfassende Meldung (EC Sales List).2
“Everything in February, nothing all year.”
Affliq works alongside the client: receipts by photo or forwarded email, invoices from the deal, payouts on import, a tax reserve every month and the VAT return prepared by the boxes of the official form. At year end the client exports a package and sends it to you.
What is in the package.
One export a year, from the data the client recorded through the year.
Bookings for DATEV, sevDesk and lexoffice
The year's bookings in your system's format, by SKR03 or SKR04, plus deals, invoices, products, payouts and receipts as files.
Invoices under § 14 UStG
Every invoice from the deal with the required details, gapless numbering and the tax case Germany, Kleinunternehmer, reverse charge EU or third country. For companies as an e-invoice in XRechnung or ZUGFeRD, corrections and cancellations as documents of their own.3
In-kind benefits with value and whereabouts
Products, trips and services instead of money, with the market value set by the client and evidenced by screenshot, business share and history. If the brand paid flat-rate tax under § 37b EStG and notified the client, the value is left out of the client's income; the client records the notice on the product and Affliq takes the value out of the income figures.4
Platform payouts with tax case
Imported statements from TikTok Shop, YouTube, Twitch, Amazon and others, each line once as a payout with tax case and ECB rate for foreign currency. Services to businesses in the EU for which the recipient owes the tax belong in the Zusammenfassende Meldung; Affliq prepares it. Kleinunternehmer file none.5
Kleinunternehmer limit and VAT return
Affliq counts total turnover by amounts received and only with taxable turnover in Germany, shows €25,000 and €100,000 and warns before an invoice crosses the limit. The VAT return is prepared by the boxes of the official form, including the tax owed under § 13b UStG on services bought from abroad.6
Evidence that stays
Records on products cannot be changed afterwards. Screenshots for the ad label are kept by Affliq as the original with hash and timestamp, and a copy is stamped with deliverable, platform and date. If a credit note shows VAT the client does not owe, Affliq warns and supplies the objection.
How firms work with creator clients and Affliq.
Creators are sole traders with many small transactions: collaborations that start in DMs, invoices to brands in three countries, credit notes from platforms, products instead of fees. The state tax administrations treat the regular activity as a business and products that may be kept after the promotion as business income at the usual retail price (Hessisches Ministerium der Finanzen, Leitfaden Influencer, S. 2 f.). What the firm lacks is rarely the rule, but the evidence.
Affliq starts on the client's side. Every collaboration is a deal with partner, fee and deliverables; the invoice comes from it with the details required by § 14 Abs. 4 UStG and the tax case Affliq derives from the partner's seat and VAT ID: Germany with tax, Kleinunternehmer with the note under § 34a UStDV, brand in the EU with „Steuerschuldnerschaft des Leistungsempfängers“ (§ 14a Abs. 1 UStG), third country without German VAT (§ 3a Abs. 2 UStG). For companies in Germany also as an e-invoice in the structured format (§ 14 Abs. 1 Satz 3 UStG).
The client records in-kind benefits with market value, evidence and history; whether kept, used up, returned or given away is in the log with a date, and notices of flat-rate taxation under § 37b EStG sit on the product. Platform payouts come in by import: Affliq knows the billing entity, country and VAT ID of the common platforms, sets the tax case, converts foreign currency at the ECB reference rate and prepares the Zusammenfassende Meldung under § 18a Abs. 2 UStG. Kleinunternehmer file none (§ 18a Abs. 4 UStG); their limit of €25,000 and €100,000 (§ 19 Abs. 1 Satz 1 UStG) is counted by Affliq as it goes, by amounts received.
Through the year the client sees a tax reserve per month, the prepared VAT return with the entries behind every box and the deadlines in the calendar. At year end the client exports a package: deals, invoices, products, payouts and receipts, plus the bookings in the format of DATEV, sevDesk or lexoffice by SKR03 or SKR04. There is no separate login for firms in Affliq; the client exports and sends.
Affliq replaces neither bookkeeping nor advice. It records, pre-sorts and evidences, so your clients arrive with complete records instead of screenshots. The tax assessment, the returns and the decision on the Kleinunternehmer rule stay with you. If you have creator clients, recommend Affliq to them, and tell us what the package is missing.
Affliq records and does the maths, it does not advise. How things are taxed is your tax adviser's call.
Frequently asked questions
Do I get access to Affliq as a tax adviser?
No, Affliq has no login for firms. Your client exports the yearly package from the app or the web portal and sends it to you; in between, they can give you the monthly report as a PDF.
Which formats does Affliq deliver?
Bookings in the format of DATEV, sevDesk or lexoffice by SKR03 or SKR04, invoices as PDF and as XRechnung or ZUGFeRD, receipts and platform statements as files, the monthly report as a PDF.
How does Affliq count the Kleinunternehmer limit?
By amounts received and only with taxable turnover in Germany, with the limits of €25,000 for the previous year and €100,000 for the current year. Affliq warns before an invoice crosses the limit and switches new invoices to 19 % from the payment that crosses it. Whether the rule makes sense for the client is for you to decide with them.7
How are in-kind benefits valued?
The client enters the market value, with screenshots of the shop price as evidence; Affliq does not take €0 from a screenshot and flags a read list price for checking. Plus business share and history. The tax administration uses the usual retail price at the place of supply less customary discounts; whether and how a product is to be recognised remains your decision.1
Can the client write and receive e-invoices?
Yes. Affliq issues invoices to companies as XRechnung or as a PDF with embedded ZUGFeRD, so in the structured format the law means, and reads received e-invoices straight from the invoice data as an expense. For Kleinunternehmer an ordinary invoice remains sufficient (§ 34a Satz 4 UStDV).8
What is Affliq not?
Not accounting software, not a tax return, not tax advice. Affliq is the upstream system on the client's side: it records deals, invoices, in-kind benefits, payouts and receipts and hands them over in a structured form. Bookkeeping, returns and advice stay with you. There is no partner programme and no firm pricing at present.
Sources
Statutes and administrative guidance. The current statutory text always prevails, and what applies to you is for your tax adviser to say.
- Hessisches Ministerium der Finanzen, Leitfaden Influencer, S. 2 f.Leitfaden zur Besteuerung von Influencerinnen und Influencern · Hessisches Ministerium der Finanzen, June 2026
- § 3a Abs. 2 UStG§ 3a UStG – Ort der sonstigen Leistung · gesetze-im-internet.de, Federal Ministry of Justice
- § 14 Abs. 4 Satz 1 UStG§ 14 UStG – Ausstellung von Rechnungen
- § 37b Abs. 3 EStG§ 37b EStG – Pauschalierung der Einkommensteuer bei Sachzuwendungen
- § 18a Abs. 2 und 4 UStG§ 18a UStG – Zusammenfassende Meldung
- § 19 Abs. 1 Satz 1 und Abs. 2 Satz 1 UStG§ 19 UStG – Besteuerung der Kleinunternehmer
- § 19 Abs. 2 Satz 1 UStG§ 19 UStG – Besteuerung der Kleinunternehmer
- § 14 Abs. 1 Satz 3 UStG§ 14 UStG – Ausstellung von Rechnungen
Further sources
- Influencer & SteuernFinanzverwaltung Nordrhein-Westfalen
- § 13b UStG – Leistungsempfänger als Steuerschuldner
- § 14a UStG – Zusätzliche Pflichten bei der Ausstellung von Rechnungen in besonderen Fällen
- § 34a UStDV – Rechnungen von Kleinunternehmern
- Zusammenfassende Meldung – AbgabepflichtFederal Central Tax Office (BZSt)
- Fragen und Antworten zur Einführung der obligatorischen E-RechnungFederal Ministry of Finance, October 2026
Clients who arrive prepared.
Recommend Affliq to your creator clients and receive a package next year instead of a shoebox.