Description: See: https://taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu/taxation/vat/vat-special-schemes_en Member states have to decide whether and under what conditions SMEs can VAT exempt their supplies. Source: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=OJ:L_202500516 (25) The platform economy has raised certain difficulties for the application of VAT rules, in particular as regards the establishment of the taxable status of the provider of the service and the level playing field between small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and other businesses. (27) In order to address the distortion of competition in the short-term accommodation rental sector and the sector of passenger transport by road, rules should be laid down to change the role that platforms play in the collection of VAT, in becoming the ‘deemed supplier’. Under the deemed-supplier model, which is a legal fiction having no impact on rules outside the VAT legislation, platforms should be required to charge VAT where underlying suppliers do not charge VAT because they are, for example, non-taxable persons or taxable persons availing themselves of the **special scheme for small enterprises**. (29) Nevertheless, where Member States consider that there is no such distortion of competition in their territory, it is appropriate to give them the possibility to exclude taxable persons availing themselves within their territory of the **special scheme for small enterprises**, which otherwise would be systematically caught under the deemed-supplier rule, from the scope of that rule. Member States should be able to establish the conditions under which that option is exercised. When exercising that option, Member States should be able to apply it in a way that does not cause any disproportionate administrative burden on the person supplying short-term accommodation rental services or passenger transport services by road, or on the taxable person facilitating such a supply. In that respect, requiring information necessary to establish whether the underlying supplier makes use of the **special scheme for small enterprises** should not be regarded as disproportionate. However, where a Member State avails itself of such an option, that is without prejudice to the general responsibility of the platforms to comply with the deemed-supplier rule.