How to avoid penalties for a tax offense?

It often happens that the owners of small and medium-sized enterprises are not aware of the obligations imposed by the regulations that they have to fulfill towards the tax office. This leads to unpleasant situations, when it suddenly turns out that they have not completed certain activities and have to explain themselves to the tax office.

Active grief

When running a business, it is easy to commit an offense or a fiscal crime, but it does not always have to be punished. When an entrepreneur realizes that he has committed a prohibited act, but was not aware of it at the time of committing it, the Fiscal Penal Code provides for rescue - it is the institution of active grief.

Active regret consists in submitting a voluntary declaration in which the taxpayer admits to a prohibited act together with an explanation of the circumstances of its commission. The persons who participated in the incident - accomplices should also be given. In return, unless the tax office itself first detected the commission of a prohibited act, the taxpayer receives a guarantee that he will not be punished.

How to distinguish a tax offense from a tax offense?

An offense is a prohibited act for which the expected fine is expressed as an amount. On the other hand, a fiscal offense is defined as unpaid liabilities in the amount or more than five times the minimum wage at the time the crime was committed.

 

Example 1. The minimum wage in 2015 is PLN 1,750. This means that if the entrepreneur was obliged to pay the tax office the amount of PLN 8,750 and more, and he did not do it - he committed a fiscal offense.

The most common type of tax offenses committed is failure to submit the declaration on time or failure to pay or reduce the tax due.

Conditions for dealing with active grief

Recognition of active regret may take place only when the entrepreneur pays the outstanding obligations, e.g. submits a declaration or pays the amounts due to the tax office.

If an active grief is filed in a situation where the law enforcement authority already has information about the offense or crime committed and has already started activities related to the disclosure of the prohibited act - the self-accusation will not be recognized. Likewise, when filed by the leader of the group responsible for the offense that was created for the offense. The exception is active grief by the entire group.

Active regret is not always necessary

There are times when it is not necessary to offer active regret. This is the case when a correction is submitted (e.g. VAT, PIT, PCC) in which, for example, the amount of tax due is underestimated. Such an action is not automatically punishable by the taxpayer, apart from charging interest for late payment.