The law blog reports (in German) that it’s now to be easier to set off language courses in other EU countries against tax in Germany. The source is beck-aktuell. This is based on a decision of the German Federal Tax Court (Bundesfinanzhof) of 13th June 2002. (If the link doesn’t work, search past decisions for 13th June 2002).

Up till now, it has automatically been assumed that a language course abroad was a private matter.

The decision also applies to Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland.

Incidentally, when I searched for Bundesfinanzministerium in Google, I got the following near the top of the list – it leads through to ebay:

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www.shopping-jl.de/bundesfinanzministerium_88.html – 10k – Cached – Similar pages