SEPA Direct Debit Mandate: Automatic Payment of Taxes and Duties

You can declare your participation in the SEPA Direct Debit Scheme to your responsible tax authority. Depending on the tax or levy, various official forms (SEPA direct debit mandates) are provided for this purpose. Link to the form center: https://www.finanzen.bremen.de/sepa-lastschriftmandate-26597

If the bank details change, a new SEPA mandate must be issued.

Please inform the competent authority in writing that you are withdrawing the SEPA mandate, stating your tax number or the cash reference number, and from when this withdrawal should apply. A specific form is not required.

For taxes, the notification can be made via myELSTER (https://www.elster.de/eportal/start).

The SEPA direct debit mandate can be submitted online via myELSTER (https://www.elster.de/eportal/start), by letter or in person. Transmission by simple e-mail is not permitted.

You can use your tax number or the cash reference number to determine the responsible authority.

• Tax number beginning with 60 or 460 = Bremen tax office
• Tax number beginning with 75 or 475 = Bremerhaven tax office
• Tax number beginning with 57 or 457 = Bremerhaven tax office

SEPA stands for "Single Payments Area". As of 01.02.2014, payment procedures had to be adapted to the rules of the Single European Payments Area (SEPA). The IBAN (International Bank Account Number) had thus replaced the account number and bank code.

This depends on which SEPA direct debit mandate you have issued. In the official form, you can limit the collection to certain tax types.

Yes, mandatory fines and land transfer tax.

You will find the contact details on the letters from the authorities.

For questions regarding the reason and amount, please contact your responsible tax office or the authority that collects the levies.

For questions relating exclusively to payment transactions, please contact the Bremen State Main Cash Office or the Cash Office at the Bremerhaven Tax Office.

Yes. The account holder must sign for this on the SEPA direct debit mandate.

The SEPA direct debit mandate may be revoked in writing at any time by the debtor or account holder.

In principle, a SEPA direct debit mandate that has already been issued remains valid for an unlimited period. Only if a SEPA direct debit mandate has not been used by the tax authorities for 36 months does it automatically expire. With each direct debit collection, these 36 months are counted from the beginning.

For technical reasons, the following notice will be issued in each notice: "Amounts can no longer be collected if your SEPA mandate has not been used again within 36 months of the last time it was used".

If you are concerned that the SEPA direct debit has not been made, please check your account statements from your bank.

Please submit an application for remission of the unjustified late payment surcharges to the competent authority (e.g. via myELSTER, letter, e-mail), stating your tax number or your tax reference number, and describe your request. The tax office cannot give you any information on this over the phone.