The Ministry of Finance of the Slovak Republic submitted a draft amendment to the Tax Administration Act (the “Tax Code”) to the legislative process. The most significant proposed changes include:
- Cancellation of registration certificates – Due to the reduction of the administrative burden, the tax administrator will not send registration certificates to taxpayers. The obligation to submit them to the tax administrator for the purpose of registering changes, as well as the obligation to return this certificate, is abolished.
- Introduction of a public index of tax reliability as a transparent and objective rating of taxpayers based on the fulfillment of obligations toward the financial administration. In case of an excellent rating, taxpayers will be entitled to statutory benefits, e.g. reduction of the fee for a binding opinion or for issuing an advance pricing agreement decision, reduction of fines and longer deadlines for response to the tax administrator. Otherwise, the taxpayers will receive the so-called “malus”, e.g. shortening the deadline for fulfilling obligations in the tax proceedings to 8 days. In case of a disagreement with the rating, the taxpayer will be entitled to file an objection.
Contrary to the current situation, details of the claims, criteria, conditions and principles that will be used as the basis for determination of taxpayer’s tax reliability index, as well as the manner in which it will be determined, will be published on the website of the Financial Directorate of the Slovak Republic.
- Establishment of the institute of individual’s exclusion – This institute will enable tax administrator to issue a decision on the individual’s exclusion, who is the statutory body of a taxpayer and seriously violates the tax obligations. The consequence of the decision on the exclusion is that the excluded individual must not act as the statutory representative or be a member of the statutory body or the supervisory body in a company or a cooperative. The period for which the tax administrator may exclude an individual by a decision is up to three years from the validity of the decision on the exclusion, while the individual may appeal against the decision. The excluded individual will not be able to file a petition for review of the decision outside the appeal proceedings or a proposal to reopen the proceedings.
This provision is proposed in connection with the regulation of disqualification of persons in the Commercial Code, as well as in the Act on Courts.
- Reduction of the fee for binding opinions – According to the draft amendment, the taxpayer will pay the amount of EUR 1,000, upon filing of the request for a binding opinion, while a highly reliable taxpayer will pay half of this amount.
