Platforms, agencies and withholding: the intermediary's duties

An agency in Rimini manages flats for thirty private owners and in July collects €80,000 of short-let rent on their behalf. Before passing the money on it keeps back €16,800, which it must pay over with an F24 form by 16 August. If it gets this wrong, the penalty does not fall on the owners: it falls on the agency, which acts as withholding agent.

Who counts as an intermediary for tax

The duties apply to anyone who carries on property brokerage professionally, even not exclusively, and takes part in concluding short-let contracts, through traditional channels or by running an online platform. Function matters, not legal form: the activity can be carried on individually or in association.

Not every shop window triggers the duties. The intermediary that reports data is the one involved in concluding the agreement, for instance when the guest accepts the offer through it or books on the platform. If the platform only shows the listing and the guest accepts by writing to the owner, it has merely put the parties in touch.

A chain of intermediaries does not multiply the duties. They fall on the one the landlord instructed. An estate agent who posts the offer on a platform remains the one liable, because the platform serves the agent and not the owner. The agent must tell the platform operator in what capacity it is acting.

The duties rest on the information supplied by the landlord, who is answerable if it is untrue. The intermediary may still take account of what it knows: if the landlord gives a VAT number for the commission invoice, the intermediary may treat the let as part of a business and not apply the short-let regime.

The 21 per cent withholding

When it collects the rent or takes part in the payment, the intermediary acts as withholding agent and keeps back 21 per cent, as a payment on account, at the moment it pays the landlord. The 2024 Budget Law kept this rate and kept it as a payment on account, whatever tax regime the recipient has chosen.

The base is the full amount the guest owes the landlord under the contract, including, when it is built into the price, the commission the landlord owes the intermediary. The flat 5 per cent reduction does not apply. Commission charged separately to the tenant, or to a landlord who does not pass it on, stays out.

Sums asked for as a security deposit or as a penalty are not part of the base. Nor is there any withholding when the guest pays by a cheque made out to the landlord, even if it passes through the intermediary's hands: the intermediary never holds the money it would have to withhold from.

Banks, payment institutions, e-money institutions, Poste and digital payment services do not withhold on card payments: they act as payment service providers, not as intermediaries in concluding the contract. The duty stays with the platform or agency that collects the money and then pays it on to the owner.

If the guest cancels after the withholding has been made, paid over and certified, the landlord recovers it in the return or claims a refund. If the cancellation comes before certification, the intermediary may hand the withholding back to the landlord and recover it by offset. The timing of the certificate decides who does the work.

Paying over and certifying

What counts is when the intermediary pays the landlord, not when the booking was made. A stay booked and paid by the guest in December but passed on to the owner in January gives rise to a January withholding: it is paid over by 16 February and carries January of the new year as its reference month.

The withholding is paid over with an F24 form by the 16th of the month after the one in which it was made. The intermediary may make a single combined payment for all of the month's withholdings. The tax code is 1919, created by Resolution 88/E of 2017, in the Treasury (Erario) section.

On the F24 the code goes with the reference month and year, in the formats 00MM and YYYY: a January 2026 withholding is entered as 0001 and 2026. When a tax representative pays, the tax code field holds that of the represented party, while the representative appears as co-obligor with identification code 72.

The intermediary certifies the withholding to the landlord under the rules on withholding-agent certificates. Doing so also fulfils its duty to report the contract data. For the owner it is the document to keep: it proves the withholding to be offset in the return.

Reporting contract data

For each contract concluded through it, the intermediary sends the Revenue Agency a set of data laid down by law and by the implementing measure. The report goes through the Agency's online services, following the technical specifications published on its website, and several contracts of the same landlord on the same property can be reported together.

• Landlord's first name, surname and tax code
• Length of the contract
• Address of the property
• National identification code (CIN) of the property
• Reference year and amount of the gross fee

The CIN is the property's national identification code provided for by Article 13-ter of Decree-Law 145 of 2023. The intermediary receives it from the landlord along with the other data: a listing uploaded without the code leaves the future report missing one of the required items.

The deadline is 30 June of the year after the contract was concluded. If the guest cancels beforehand, the data need not be sent; if the cancellation comes after the report, the intermediary corrects it through the Agency's online procedures.

The penalty is the one in Article 11 of Legislative Decree 471 of 1997, from €250 to €2,000. It is halved if the data are sent within 15 days after the deadline, or if the correct report is sent within that time. An error caused by the landlord's conduct is not penalised.

Failing to withhold is penalised separately, with the administrative penalty in Article 14 of the same decree, and voluntary correction (ravvedimento operoso) remains available. They are two distinct breaches: a platform that sends the data but does not withhold, or the other way round, answers for the one it committed.

Non-resident intermediaries

Many platforms are based abroad. One with a permanent establishment in Italy complies through it, like a resident intermediary. One resident in another EU State with no permanent establishment in Italy may comply directly or appoint a tax representative as the party responsible for the tax.

One resident outside the EU complies through its permanent establishment in a Member State; if it has none, it appoints a tax representative. If it fails to do so, companies of the same group resident in Italy are jointly liable for making and paying over the withholding.

Tourist tax and record keeping

Whoever collects the rent or takes part in the payment is also liable for paying the tourist tax and the stay contribution, with a right to recover them from guests, and for the other duties in the municipal regulation. When the platform collects, that liability is the platform's.

The tourist tax return is filed on a combined basis and only online, by 30 June of the year after the one in which the tax arose. The tax exists only in municipalities that have introduced it, and its amount and detailed rules are in the regulation of the municipality where the property stands.

Intermediaries keep the data used for their reports and the payment records for as long as a tax assessment can be served: until 31 December of the fifth year after the return was filed, or the seventh where no return or a void return was filed.

• Every month: withholding on payments to landlords, paid over by F24 by the 16th of the next month, code 1919
• For each landlord: a certificate of the withholding, which also counts as the data report
• By 30 June of the following year: sending the data of contracts concluded
• By 30 June of the following year: combined tourist tax return, where the intermediary collects
• For five years after the return, or seven if none was filed: keeping the data and payment records

For a small agency managing a few dozen homes, this calendar weighs as much as an employer's payroll calendar. Tie every payment to an owner to a register showing gross fee, commission, withholding and month of payment: it is the same base needed for certifying and for reporting.

What is left for the owner to do

The intermediary's withholding does not close the owner's account with the tax authorities. By the deadline for the income tax balance the owner works out the tax due, ordinary or flat, subtracts the withholding suffered and pays any difference. Tax, withholding and balance are all shown in the income tax return.

If the withholding exceeds the tax, the excess is offset against other taxes or claimed back. That can happen under the ordinary regime when tax credits cut the IRPEF due. Someone applying the 26 per cent cedolare to a second flat will normally have a balance to pay, since the withholding covers only 21 points.

An owner who lets directly, with no agency or platform collecting on his behalf, suffers no withholding. He pays all the tax through the balance and, when due, the advance payments, on the IRPEF calendar. Doing without an intermediary saves a commission, but shifts the whole burden of calculating and paying onto the owner.

Read the certificate you receive carefully. It shows the gross fees on which the intermediary withheld and the amount withheld: the first must match the year's bookings, the second is the figure to enter on the return. Any gap should be cleared up with the intermediary before the return is filed, not afterwards.

Owners do well to keep a file for each year with the certificates received, the list of bookings and the receipts for any metered recharges. It is how to check that the certified amount matches takings, to offset the right withholding and to defend the taxable base if there is an audit.

This part of Decree-Law 50 of 2017 also changes from 2027: the later version of Article 4 shows the paragraphs on the withholding and on non-resident intermediaries as repealed by Legislative Decree 117 of 2026. The rules in this module apply to 2026 lets and to their deadlines.