Italy Cuts Taxes on Visiting Private Aircraft

The Italian government has approved an amendment to the contentious tax on business aircraft that it made law on April 29. Now, foreign-registered aircraft operated privately will incur the tax only if they stay for 45 consecutive days, rather than the 48-hour threshold in effect until now. The amendment, which is expected to be endorsed by the Italian parliament, would also reduce the rate of the tax by 50 percent.

Responding to the move, the European Business Aviation Association (EBAA) commented, “In our opinion the Italian government has realized this tax was a mistake negatively affecting foreign investments and has decided to downgrade it to an almost irrelevant degree. According to our interpretation, to trigger the application of this tax, the stay in Italy has to be for more than 45 days in a row. We therefore believe that subsequent stays of less than 45 consecutive days cannot be cumulative.”

The tax will still apply to commercial charter operations, but on a different basis. In this case, a tax will apply at €100 ($123) per passenger for each leg under 1,500 km (809 nm), and €200 ($246) for each leg if more than 1,500 km. For example, €800 ($984) would be charged for two passengers flying a round trip from Chicago to Rome. Any additional domestic flights within Italy are counted as extra “legs.”