Binding primary sources
EU and national legislation, official journals, authorities, and registers.
Research and trust
How smbf.me researches, reviews, and publishes country guidance.
Binding law, operational instructions, market information, and service availability answer different questions. Material statements are tied to a source and date; paid work is tied to a written scope.
Source hierarchy
Use the strongest source available for the claim.
Operational primary sources
Official portal manuals, forms, approved-scheme tariffs, and public datasets.
Expert secondary sources
Recognised legal, accounting, trade, and academic analysis.
Commercial and community sources
Useful for market claims and customer problems, but insufficient alone for a legal duty or official fee.
Review workflow
A country answer starts with the official source.
The source, effective date, interpretation, and operational route are checked separately before the answer is used in customer work.
- 01Find the official text
- 02Check scope and date
- 03Confirm the operating route
- 04Publish and monitor
Service boundaries
The page explains the rule. The proposal explains the job.
A customer can use country information without buying a service. Registration, representation, and filing support begin only after the exact country route, roles, access, and deliverables are confirmed.
Country information
Read the current route and open the official sources.
This is general information, not a conclusion about your company.Obligation review
Review the likely duties using your entity, sales, and packaging facts.
Unresolved facts remain open; no registration or filing is included.Report preparation
Prepare a supported calculation, working file, and evidence pack.
Prepared does not mean submitted, acknowledged, or accepted.External country work
Scope registration, a scheme, an AR, or filing support for a named country.
The proposal names the executor, authority, deliverable, price, and exclusions.What “L4” means in detailed capability records
L4 is shorthand for assisted filing: a defined submission route is coordinated and filing evidence is retained. On customer pages we use the plain term “assisted filing”. It is not authority approval, automatic statutory representation, guaranteed acceptance, or a fully managed service.
Unknowns policy
Missing is not zero.
Missing information remains unknown or needs review. It is never silently converted to zero, not applicable, or not required.
Rates and estimates
Every number carries context.
A rate includes country, scheme, stream, material, unit, currency, effective dates, fixed or minimum amounts, source, and the date that source was checked.
Corrections
The old answer is not erased.
A material correction records the previous statement, new statement, reason, affected periods, date, and reviewer.
Capability
Research is not delivery.
Country knowledge and smbf.me service availability have separate evidence, dates, and owners.
Next step
Found something that may have changed?
Send the source and the statement you believe needs review. A correction is logged before copy changes.