Tax & Legal Update
Guidance on determining beneficial ownership
The Advocate General has recently presented her views on a number of cases pending before the Court of Justice of the EU and dealing with beneficial ownership and its interpretation for the purposes of the EU directives. These legal disputes usually…
Limits of tax sanctions for Švarc system
In recent years the Supreme Administrative Court has repeatedly ruled in favour of a stricter tax treatment of income from activities carried out by self-employed persons within a Švarc system. However, in its decision of February 2018 the court…
SAC did not accept brokerage fee paid to unrelated party as deductible
The Supreme Administrative Court did not accept a brokerage fee (commission) paid to an unrelated party as a deductible expense despite supporting documents and witness testimonies. The burden of proof is on the service recipient who has to prove…
Finally, a more reasonable approach to taking over employees?
Not long ago, the Supreme Court (SC) gave employers quite a scare: it held that when continuing an activity previously carried out by another entrepreneur, they might have to take over that entrepreneur’s employees, even without the circumstances of…
How private is one’s hard drive at work?
May employers inspect the contents of their employees’ work computers? The European Court of Human Rights recently dealt with this issue in the Libert v. France case. It held that employers may search files that are not clearly identified as private…
CJEU: effect of subsequent modifications of transfer prices on customs value of goods
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has issued its first ruling on the effect of subsequent adjustments to transfer prices on the customs value of goods imported to the EU. According to the judgement, even if a group’s transfer pricing…
New digital economy taxation rules
In March, the European Commission issued two draft directives on the digital economy: the first one proposes to introduce a tax on digital services; the second one the concept of a virtual permanent establishment.
Tax planning may be subject to reporting duty
In mid-March, the ECOFIN Council reached political agreement on the rules requiring intermediaries (tax advisors, attorneys, other advisors) or taxpayers to disclose information on potentially aggressive cross-border tax planning arrangements. This…
Online shopping without borders
We all got used very quickly to the abolition of roaming charges within the EU. And we may also enjoy prepaid Netflix, HBO Go, Amazon Prime, Spotify or Deezer subscriptions while travelling within the European Union. Yet another step towards the…
Collection of Deeds one gaping void – what does the new bill say?
The Ministry of Justice has started preparing an amendment to the Corporations Act, aiming to reduce the regulatory burden for entrepreneurs while shedding more light on non-transparent corporate structures. It also intends to enforce the duty to…
Brexit: customs and indirect taxes if Great Britain turns into a third country
The two-year deadline that started on the date Great Britain announced its intention to exit the EU will expire on 29 March 2019. If Britain and the EU do not agree on a specific transitory period by then, any and all primary and secondary EU laws…
Extended information duty towards tax administrators currently in the Senate
In early spring, the Chamber of Deputies approved an amendment to the Tax Procedure Code, expanding the information duty towards tax administrators from financial institutions to attorneys and tax advisors. A draft amendment and motions to amend the…