On November 22nd has been published a draft of a decree specifying the method of transmission, by the means of electronic communication, of the tax books and technical requirements for IT data carriers, on which these books can be stored and provided to the President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection beginning January 1st 2020.
The details of changes
The amended Act as of March 8th, 2013 on preventing excessive delays in commercial transactions granted the President of UOKiK the right to request the submission of the part or all the tax books kept by the entrepreneurs, so-called SAF-T files upon request.
The new competences of the President of UOKiK enter into force January 1st, 2020 and empower to demand the above-mentioned SAF-T files also from the entities that are not the parties to a commercial transaction.
The decree draft published on the website of the Government Legislation Center contains implementation provisions for the Act granting new entitlements to the President of UOKiK.
Under the new provisions, the entrepreneurs are obligated to provide standard audit files for tax upon request of the President of UOKiK in two ways:
- electronic platform for public administration services (ePUAP),
- on IT data carriers.
The project also specifies technical requirements, which the IT data carriers should meet. They include:
- labeling in a manner allowing for an unambiguous identification of the carrier,
- facilitation for the transfer between commonly available reading devices,
- accommodation for storage at the temperature of 18-22°C and with relative humidity of 40-50%.
It needs to be highlighted that, neither the Act introducing new competences for the President of UOKiK, nor the draft of the decree specify what sanctions may be imposed for the failure to submit SAF-T files upon the request of the antitrust authority.
Nevertheless, financial penalties for the failure to provide information requested by the President of the Office or providing false or misleading information may be very severe and amount to up to 5% of the revenue accomplished in the previous tax year, but not more than the equivalent of 50 million EUR.
It is important that, the above-mentioned financial penalties also apply to the entities which are not the parties to a commercial transaction.
The provisions of the decree will enter into force January 1st, 2020.
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