If you pass media spend on to a client, it is either a disbursement or your own revenue. A disbursement is an amount you pay in the name and for the account of the client. Then you charge no VAT on it and it does not count as your revenue.
If you buy the media in your own name, you are the buyer yourself. You then charge 21% VAT on the whole amount, it is revenue in your annual accounts, and you have to pay the media owner, even if the client does not pay.
In short
- A disbursement is only a purchase in the name and for the account of the client. The media owner's invoice is then in the client's name. "Costs for the client's account" on your invoice is not enough.
- If you buy in your own name, even for the client's account, VAT treats you as buyer and seller of the service. You charge 21% on media plus fee, and in the annual accounts it is usually your revenue.
- In your own name you carry the credit risk on the whole budget. Invoice media in advance or keep the account in the client's name, and the risk stays small.
In this article
When is passed-on media spend a disbursement?
Only if you buy the media in the name and for the account of the client. The Belastingdienst describes disbursements as costs that you, as the seller, pay in the name and for the account of your customer, such as fees for a permit (Belastingdienst, on what not to charge VAT). You charge no VAT on a disbursement.
In the client's name means: the client is the party to the contract with the media owner. The contract and the media owner's invoice are in the client's name. You only pay on the client's behalf, or you arrange the purchase while the client pays. The client then deducts the VAT on the media owner's invoice itself.
Civil law recognises both forms. Under a mandate you perform legal acts for the client's account, and the agreement may be that you do so in your own name or in the client's name (Civil Code Book 7, article 414). Record in the engagement letter which of the two you do.
The law provides for this in article 8 of the Dutch VAT Act. VAT is calculated on the consideration, and a general order may determine that outlays and other amounts treated as disbursements are not part of the consideration (VAT Act 1968, article 8 paragraphs 1, 2 and 5).
For online campaigns this is often simple to arrange in practice. If the advertising account is in the client's name and the client pays the platform with its own means of payment, the media amount does not pass through your books. You invoice only your own work.
What if you buy the media in your own name?
Then for VAT you are yourself the buyer and seller of the media. The law says that services provided through a commission agent, who contracts in their own name but for someone else's account, are deemed to have been provided to and then by that agent (VAT Act 1968, article 4(4)).
The result: the media amount is part of your consideration. You charge 21% VAT on media and fee together. You deduct the VAT on the media owner's purchase invoice yourself as input tax. For the client it looks like the same amount, but your VAT return shows the whole campaign as turnover.
If you buy from a platform in another EU country, you usually receive an invoice without VAT stating that VAT is reverse-charged. You calculate that VAT yourself in your return and then deduct it again if you are entitled to deduct (Ondernemersplein, importing services from an EU country). The media amount then remains your purchase and passing it on remains your revenue.
The words "costs for the client's account" on your invoice do not change this. What decides is who is the party to the contract with the media owner. The Belastingdienst gives a comparable example for delivery costs: if they are for the seller's account and risk, they are not a disbursement but part of the consideration (Belastingdienst, on what not to charge VAT).
Does passed-on media count as revenue in your annual accounts?
That depends on who carries the risk. Guideline 270 of the Dutch Accounting Standards Board says that amounts you receive for your own account, as principal, are revenue. Amounts you receive for third parties, as agent, are not revenue (Guideline 270, paragraph 105a). An agent is an intermediary who only arranges the deal.
The guideline lists features of a principal. You are primarily responsible for delivery, you are free to set the price, and you carry significant credit risk on the amount the client owes. No single feature decides on its own (Guideline 270, paragraph 105b).
A fixed amount or fixed percentage per transaction points to an agent. An intermediary who contracts for the account of third parties then takes only the commission as revenue (Guideline 270, paragraph 105c). If you charge a fixed fee of 10% on a budget that the client pays to the media owner itself, only that fee is your revenue.
The difference matters for thresholds based on turnover. The small businesses scheme (KOR) applies to turnover of at most € 20,000 per calendar year, excluding VAT (Belastingdienst, KOR conditions). A freelancer who invoices € 15,000 of own work and € 10,000 of media in their own name is already above it. The size class of your private limited company for the annual accounts also depends partly on net turnover (Civil Code Book 2, article 396).
The sector knows that revenue says little here. For advertising agencies, the cost of sales was on average 47% of net turnover in 2024 (CBS, table 81156ned, SBI 731 advertising). VIA Nederland, the association of media, advertising and communications agencies, uses annual turnover or gross agency income to set its membership fee (VIA Nederland, general terms). Gross agency income is revenue minus what you pass on.
Who pays the media owner if the client does not pay?
If you buy in your own name, you pay the media owner, even if the client does not pay. You are the contracting party. The client does owe you the expenses that come with the assignment (Civil Code Book 7, article 406), but that is a claim on a client who is already not paying at that point.
The risk grows with the budget. In the worked example, buying in the client's name leaves € 2,420 of yours outstanding. Buying in your own name makes that € 14,520, while you yourself owe the media owner € 12,100. A client that goes bankrupt then costs you the whole media budget, not just your fee.
Your VAT is affected too. You pay VAT on the invoice you send, not only once the client pays (VAT Act 1968, article 13(1)). With a large media invoice you therefore pre-finance 21% until the client pays, or until you reclaim the VAT if the debt proves uncollectable.
How agencies are paid for media has been shifting for a long time. Research among US advertisers describes advertisers pushing to reduce commission on media and to link pay to results (Spake, D'Souza, Crutchfield & Morgan, 1999). An agency that no longer earns commission on media has little reason to keep carrying the risk on that budget.
How do you limit the risk on media spend?
Have the client pay for the media itself or invoice the media budget in advance. Then you have the money before you spend it. There are four ways to do that.
- Contract and account in the client's name. The client pays the media owner or platform itself, you invoice only your work.
- Invoice the media budget in advance. For an advance payment by a business, you must issue an invoice before the amount falls due (VAT Act 1968, articles 34c and 34g).
- Buying the budget in parts, per month or per flight, and only buying once the previous part has been paid.
- A short payment term for the media parts in your terms, with statutory commercial interest if the client pays late.
When invoicing in advance, watch the timing of the VAT. If the consideration is paid in advance, VAT is due at the latest when you receive the money (VAT Act 1968, article 13(2)). That suits media budgets well: you receive the money and the VAT in the same period.
What late payment costs you in interest and time is covered in a separate article (what late payment by customers costs you). For media spend in your own name that applies even more, because you have already paid the money to the media owner yourself.
What do you put on the invoice to the client?
Put your own work and the disbursement on separate lines. You charge 21% VAT on your fee. You put the disbursement on the invoice without VAT, with a reference to the media owner's invoice in the client's name.
If you buy in your own name, there is no disbursement. Media, production and fee are then together the consideration for your service, with 21% VAT on the whole. You may list them separately on the invoice, so the client can see what the media cost and what your work was.
A mark-up on media, for example a handling fee as a percentage of the budget, is always your revenue with VAT. Even if the media itself is a disbursement, the mark-up remains payment for your own work.
Keep for each campaign
The contract or purchase order with the media owner, in the client's name or yours, the media owner's invoice, the proof of payment, and the engagement letter stating whether you buy in the client's name or your own. With those documents you can show during an audit why an amount did or did not carry VAT.
Sources
- Turnover Tax Act 1968 (Wet op de omzetbelasting 1968), article 4(4), article 8, article 13, article 34c and article 34g, in force from 1 January 2026. wetten.overheid.nl
- Belastingdienst, On what do you not charge VAT? (in Dutch), accessed 31 October 2026. belastingdienst.nl
- Ondernemersplein, Importing services from an EU country (in Dutch), accessed 31 October 2026. ondernemersplein.overheid.nl
- Dutch Accounting Standards Board, Guideline 270 The income statement (amended 2021), RJ-Uiting 2020-15 annex 2, paragraphs 105a to 105c (in Dutch). rjnet.nl
- Belastingdienst, Conditions of the small businesses scheme (in Dutch), accessed 31 October 2026. belastingdienst.nl
- Dutch Civil Code Book 2, article 396, in force from 1 July 2026. wetten.overheid.nl
- Dutch Civil Code Book 7, article 406 and article 414. wetten.overheid.nl
- CBS (Statistics Netherlands), Business economy, labour and financial data by sector (SBI 2008), table 81156ned, SBI 731 Advertising, 2024, updated 24 April 2026. opendata.cbs.nl
- VIA Nederland, General membership terms (in Dutch), accessed 31 October 2026. vianederland.nl
- Spake, D. F., D'Souza, G., Crutchfield, T. N. & Morgan, R. M. (1999). Advertising agency compensation: an agency theory explanation. Journal of Advertising, 28(3), 53-72. doi.org